Speaker 1: Life audio.
Speaker 2: Is there a good reason to believe reincarnation is true?
Speaker 1: Let's say this little boy's name is Sam, and he'll say,
Speaker 1: don't call me Sam anymore. My name is Peter. No, honey,
Speaker 1: we gave you the name Sam. No, but I'm Peter.
Speaker 1: I know I'm Peter, and I lived in the town
Speaker 1: of x That's famous. Those are famous. Little kids have
Speaker 1: a lot of details.
Speaker 2: On a popular level, so many people in America, some
Speaker 2: who claimed to be Christians and worldwide, embrace reincarnation.
Speaker 1: The best critique is this, I will take either discarnate
Speaker 1: possession or demon possession. These are almost toss ups. I
Speaker 1: don't like demon possession, but discarnate is a toughie, and
Speaker 1: I think it's a good rival and position.
Speaker 2: One third of all Americans claim to believe in reincarnation,
Speaker 2: and the number is even higher among millennials and gen z.
Speaker 2: Is there a good reason to believe reincarnation is true?
Speaker 2: Do near death experiences evidence for reincarnation? And how does
Speaker 2: the evidence for reincarnation compare with the evidence for the
Speaker 2: resurrection of Jesus. Our guest today is perhaps the world's
Speaker 2: leading expert on the resurrection, been on this show many
Speaker 2: times a personal friend, doctor Gary Harbrmos, thanks for coming back.
Speaker 1: I am glad to be with you. Doctor Sean.
Speaker 2: Well, on that note, let's jump in. I've actually been
Speaker 2: thinking about this episode for a long time. I've never
Speaker 2: done a deep dive on this, and it's so prevalent
Speaker 2: today that in some ways I'm surprised that I haven't.
Speaker 2: But let me start by just asking this question. When
Speaker 2: you wrote your book Beyond Death, there's about a quarter
Speaker 2: of Americans say the turn of the twenty first century
Speaker 2: bleeds to reincarnation. Now it's about a third. Why do
Speaker 2: you think so many Americans and beyond believe in it?
Speaker 1: I think there's a lot of answers to that, But
Speaker 1: just to mention a few off the top of the
Speaker 1: the bat here, I don't think it's for intellectual reasons
Speaker 1: for the most part. Now, remember you work on one
Speaker 1: side of the ocean, and I work on the other
Speaker 1: side of the ocean. It's not as common over here.
Speaker 1: I have to introduce it to my students. They don't
Speaker 1: bring it up. I mean, I mean PhD students. They
Speaker 1: don't bring it up in philosophy or in PhD apologetics
Speaker 1: classes and say, hey, I've been having to deal with
Speaker 1: the reincarnation. Lady, I haven't heard this objection in years,
Speaker 1: so I think it does have a lot to do
Speaker 1: with where you live. I think that's one thing. Another thing,
Speaker 1: I think this generation, these generations that you mentioned, are
Speaker 1: not real well grounded. When I see surveys on how
Speaker 1: scholarship goes for college students, I hear more and more
Speaker 1: things like, oh, I'm doing all my degrees online. What
Speaker 1: do you have to do? Not a lot. I just
Speaker 1: kind of read these articles and I read a few
Speaker 1: paragraphs and I'm ready to go. I think up some
Speaker 1: good reasons and I could you know? And and then
Speaker 1: I see something on Wikipedia or something and it says
Speaker 1: college students today, I think they're scholars after reading an
Speaker 1: article and they usually quit halfway through the article. So
Speaker 1: I'm not putting down college kids. I don't teach that level.
Speaker 1: I teach PhD students. But it's like, no one's into
Speaker 1: reading and studying now. It's like, go on your phone
Speaker 1: and read a few things. And I think we are
Speaker 1: into I don't want to say equality and religion, but
Speaker 1: I think we are into plurality. I think we are
Speaker 1: into anything goes. I think we are into well, I
Speaker 1: don't want to put you down, and I don't want
Speaker 1: to say your view is false. And what about the
Speaker 1: problem of evil? Well, come on, I know what the
Speaker 1: Bible says, but things have changed a lot, and I
Speaker 1: kind of think God will approve of anybody who seeks him. Honestly,
Speaker 1: you know, I think it's all those things. I think
Speaker 1: it's changing world views and changing times, not well thought
Speaker 1: out positions.
Speaker 2: That's really fair that. The only thing I would throw
Speaker 2: in there is we've just seen such an explosion of
Speaker 2: interest in Eastern religions and new spiritualities over the past
Speaker 2: few decades, and I argue the past two or three
Speaker 2: years there's kind of this growth and interest in supernatural
Speaker 2: phenomenon and we're seeing the data and millennial and gen
Speaker 2: z express that interest. But of course they're not shifting
Speaker 2: back towards historic Christianity traditional faiths always, but sometimes in
Speaker 2: New Age Now, I think it might be really helpful
Speaker 2: to define what we mean by reincarnation and maybe compare
Speaker 2: and contrast what reincarnation is and how it's similar and
Speaker 2: or different from what we mean by resurrection.
Speaker 1: Sure, I would say that, Well, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1: Let me use the definition of the he's passed away
Speaker 1: now a few years ago, but he was known as
Speaker 1: the world's leading scholar and reincarnation had a very to
Speaker 1: his position. He was a psychiatrist in the area of
Speaker 1: brain sciences at University of Virginia, one of the top
Speaker 1: universities in the country, and his name was Ian Stevenson.
Speaker 1: Last time I heard, well, I mean he's passed away now.
Speaker 1: But years ago i'd heard that he'd written five books
Speaker 1: on reincarnation and one maybe the best known one published
Speaker 1: by the University of Virginia Press, was called Twenty Cases
Speaker 1: Suggestive of Reincarnation. And he was a nice guy, well spoken.
Speaker 1: I'd never found him to be dogmatic. He would lay
Speaker 1: data out there, and when you would give data on
Speaker 1: the other side, he'd say, hey, I understand, I can
Speaker 1: roll with that. I just think there's some data for reincarnation.
Speaker 1: And you say, well, here's a comeback or two. He'd say, hey,
Speaker 1: you give me your one or two and I'll give
Speaker 1: you a couple more reasons. That why reincarnation is kind
Speaker 1: of you know, you know, that's why his books entitled
Speaker 1: twenty Cases Suggestive. And here's how he defines it. He says,
Speaker 1: re incarnation is when one spirit enters another person, but
Speaker 1: in between conception and birth. That's reincarnation. Possession, which he
Speaker 1: does a lot of talking about and I will too.
Speaker 1: Possession is a spirit entering another person's spirit in between
Speaker 1: birth and life, sometime in the living process. But reincarnation
Speaker 1: is prior to birth, between conception and birth, and that's
Speaker 1: going to become really significant here as we get talking,
Speaker 1: because there's some cases that Stevenson gives where he says, well,
Speaker 1: I've found some cases I think reincarnation's true, but I'll
Speaker 1: give you a couple cases where reincarnation by my definition
Speaker 1: is not true and it looks more like possession, and
Speaker 1: he just says things just I mean, he's I think
Speaker 1: he's pretty straightforward.
Speaker 2: So reincarnation is a soul that stays constant over time
Speaker 2: and reanimates a new body sometime between say birth and
Speaker 2: conception or conception and birth.
Speaker 1: That's correct, conception and birth.
Speaker 2: Possession would be a separate, at least one additional spirit
Speaker 2: taking over an existing spirit that is animating a body,
Speaker 2: so there's at least two, or in the case of
Speaker 2: the demoniac, there's multiple possessing the individual. That's one key distinction,
Speaker 2: define resurrection for.
Speaker 1: Us sean before I go to resurrection, I'd be glad
Speaker 1: to do that, of course. But let's how about a
Speaker 1: third definition. Okay, what's the difference between possession and oppression?
Speaker 1: Because in some of the some of the best treatments
Speaker 1: of possession, and there's more than one kind, by the way,
Speaker 1: but some of the best cases of possession are oppression.
Speaker 1: And you say, well, that's that's not possession. No it's not.
Speaker 1: But some of the books will say possession can be
Speaker 1: so strong that many people will think it's a case
Speaker 1: of possession. In other words, as a clouding of definitions
Speaker 1: between oppression and possession. So you can be really bothered
Speaker 1: but not really infiltrated. If that makes.
Speaker 2: Sense, Yeah, it does.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 2: Reincarnation would be an individual soul that would have multiple lives,
Speaker 2: lived through different bodies at different times. And of course
Speaker 2: we don't have to go there, but in some faiths
Speaker 2: it would be a common soul that takes over a
Speaker 2: non human body for a season or a time. But reincarnation,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, resurrection give us a definition of what we
Speaker 2: mean by that.
Speaker 1: Resurrection is usually a definition where one person dies and
Speaker 1: lives again. Now, that person. There's different discussions about what
Speaker 1: this new body is, and boy, this could take us
Speaker 1: all day, so you don't want to you don't want
Speaker 1: to go to a lot of detail here. But the
Speaker 1: traditional Christian response is that after the death of a
Speaker 1: human body, there's an uh, well, colloquial language would be
Speaker 1: an in between state. But this state right after death
Speaker 1: is usually believed to be disembodied. So I love what
Speaker 1: Peter Krefft says that the Thomas philosopher who he accepts
Speaker 1: the Thomas accept the Thomas and the Aristotelian tradition, not
Speaker 1: the Platonist one. But he still says this comment about
Speaker 1: the intermediate state. He says Plato is right as far
Speaker 1: as he went, and I think the great comment. In
Speaker 1: other words, the Christian view tewod Corinthians five seems to
Speaker 1: be that immediate after death, immediately after death the person
Speaker 1: is does not live and in between ron falses you're
Speaker 1: still with the Lord and it's better than here. But
Speaker 1: he says I wished I weren't here too long, because
Speaker 1: twice in those ten verses and second Corinthians five he says,
Speaker 1: I don't want to be found naked, and the Greek
Speaker 1: word there naked refers to bodyless. So if you go
Speaker 1: back to Peter Craft, he's going to say, yep, that's
Speaker 1: my point, because I'm atoms and I believe we have
Speaker 1: to be re embodied to be our full persons. But
Speaker 1: there is an intermediate state and then there's a final
Speaker 1: state resurrection has to do. The traditional Christian view is
Speaker 1: living forever, and you can't say in a different body,
Speaker 1: but you'd say, you'd say living forever and your body,
Speaker 1: but for eternity, and.
Speaker 2: Of course that is a transformed now immortal body that
Speaker 2: won't die again, as Paul says in one Corinthians fifteen.
Speaker 2: So oftentimes feel think resurrection is just coming back to life.
Speaker 2: But like we saw with those Elijah and Paul raised,
Speaker 2: and the three Jesus raised Lazarus, son of the widow
Speaker 2: at Nane and the daughter of Gyrus, they were to
Speaker 2: die again. Resurrected body is animated for eternity. Although physical,
Speaker 2: it's our same body, but even greater than it is
Speaker 2: here with the limitations of sin.
Speaker 1: What right? And usually it said that that starts after
Speaker 1: the return of Christ. Whatever, you know, there's different views
Speaker 1: on you know what that is too. You know did
Speaker 1: did well? I don't want to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, don't worry about that right now. We'll get a
Speaker 2: side on that.
Speaker 1: But it's after Christ came back, and that's the Christian
Speaker 1: view exactly. It's a new body. It's a new body,
Speaker 1: but it's my body. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And the key distinction and re incarnation, you die, come back, die,
Speaker 2: come back many or potentially infant number of times. Resurrection
Speaker 2: you die once and you face judgment. That's the key
Speaker 2: difference here for people to see. Now you lay out
Speaker 2: in your book, you have a chapter on this and
Speaker 2: Beyond Death where you give some of the different kinds
Speaker 2: of evidence is often cited for reincarnation. List out some
Speaker 2: of those for us if you will.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I give five in that chapter. So
Speaker 1: it's not like reincarnation are so stupid you can't think
Speaker 1: of any reason for it. But I think by far,
Speaker 1: if I believe the reincarnation, my chief evidence would be cases,
Speaker 1: very well known cases. Now you don't have very long
Speaker 1: to look for them. Children who will give you example.
Speaker 1: You have to use Indian names. You usually mariincarnation happens
Speaker 1: in Indian or Indian friendly cultures. That's not always a case,
Speaker 1: but let's say, this little boy's name is Sam, and
Speaker 1: sometime after his birth, he could be very young, he
Speaker 1: could be three or four, and he'll say, don't call
Speaker 1: me Sam anymore. My name is Peter. No, honey, we
Speaker 1: gave you the name Sam. No, but I'm Peter. I
Speaker 1: know I'm Peter. And I lived in the town of
Speaker 1: X and I even remember who my parents were, and
Speaker 1: I remember the house. It looks like this. And they'll say, well, well,
Speaker 1: that's true or false, you know, and he'll say, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: it looks like this. And when you go in the house,
Speaker 1: you turn left and you go down the hallway and
Speaker 1: the third room on the right is my bedroom. And
Speaker 1: so the parents do a little bit of checking and
Speaker 1: they find out, you know, because he tells them the
Speaker 1: town and where's a house like this? And this culture
Speaker 1: is really open to this. They've heard these stories. So
Speaker 1: other parents are used to helping you do this. And
Speaker 1: they bring the little guy there, the newly made Peter,
Speaker 1: and he takes you to the house and turns left
Speaker 1: and goes down and there's his bedroom. He goes, well,
Speaker 1: they've changed this all around, but my bed used to
Speaker 1: be over there underneath the window. So he knows a
Speaker 1: lot about this, and that's famous. Those are famous. Little
Speaker 1: kids have a lot of details. Lesser examples, but they
Speaker 1: can still be something that convinces some people. Of course,
Speaker 1: would be cases of scars. Let's see, let's say Sam
Speaker 1: slash Peter talks to the parents and they say, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: he had this real strange birthmark on his left shoulder.
Speaker 1: Oh you mean like this, And the guy pulls his
Speaker 1: shirt down and they go, yeah, just like that. Where
Speaker 1: did you get that? So birthmarks are deformities, a limp
Speaker 1: and the same leg that the other boy had. Sometimes
Speaker 1: these people can even tell you where the boys are buried.
Speaker 1: But a deformity or a scar, that's one we're familiar
Speaker 1: with us and Christian. But glossolalia or speaking in tongues.
Speaker 1: This guy might start rattling off a different language and
Speaker 1: he might talk in the dialect that Peter spoke in.
Speaker 1: But remember his name, his given name is Sam, and
Speaker 1: he starts talking to that language. So there's three of
Speaker 1: them right there, and those are three of the best ones.
Speaker 1: The main one is details, I can tell you where
Speaker 1: I lived, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and deformities.
Speaker 1: Speaking in tongues. I mean by that not your birth language,
Speaker 1: but you're pretty good at it and you're only four
Speaker 1: years old. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So that's a great list. And the other one that
Speaker 2: we're going to get to is some of the so
Speaker 2: called biblical evidence in favor of reincarnation. That's really interesting.
Speaker 2: We'll take that one by one. Now we're going to
Speaker 2: walk through some of the claims. Get your response to it.
Speaker 2: But the way you frame this the first time I
Speaker 2: read this chapter years ago was really eye opening to me.
Speaker 1: Here's what you said.
Speaker 2: You said, are there other hypotheses other than reincarnation that
Speaker 2: can account for much of the same data? In other words,
Speaker 2: if there are two hypotheses that explain the data equally
Speaker 2: or at least sufficiently, how do many reincarnation experts choose
Speaker 2: and how should we choose which option between those two
Speaker 2: is the best?
Speaker 1: Okay, let me use Ian Stevenson. Now people may have
Speaker 1: missed this, but when I call them a psychiatrist, you
Speaker 1: remember a psychiatrist as an MD. A psychologist is a
Speaker 1: best a PhD. So he's a medical doctor University of Virginia.
Speaker 1: He's really up on this stuff from medical viewpoint, and
Speaker 1: he admits in his book. I cite the book several
Speaker 1: times in that chapter, and he himself says, the best
Speaker 1: two hypotheses are reincarnation and possession. And several times throughout
Speaker 1: well the chapter where I cite him several times, you'll say,
Speaker 1: and actually here possession and seems like it's pretty good.
Speaker 1: And then he'll introduce he'll introduce another problem. He'll go, well,
Speaker 1: there's a number of ways to explain this, but the
Speaker 1: best to, well, we can just cut to the chase.
Speaker 1: The best to are still reincarnation and possession. He says
Speaker 1: it over and over again. Now you may have a
Speaker 1: quote there. I've got one here. I can read it
Speaker 1: if you want please. This is this is Ian Stevenson himself,
Speaker 1: the lading leading scholar. And it's not because he's like
Speaker 1: not a believer. He wrote the book twenty cases suggests
Speaker 1: of reincarnation. Here he is. He says that the data
Speaker 1: fall quote a long continuum in which the distinction between
Speaker 1: reincarnation and possession becomes blurred close quote. Then he says
Speaker 1: another statement, the data quote do not permit a firm
Speaker 1: decision between the hypothesis of possession and reincarnation. Close quote.
Speaker 1: Now it seems like he He definitely is saying these
Speaker 1: are the two best, but it almost sounds at points
Speaker 1: I got another one here. I can read you, but
Speaker 1: it almost sounds like he thinks it's a toss up.
Speaker 1: Now he'll tell you why he doesn't like. Well, this
Speaker 1: is I don't know how far you want to go
Speaker 1: to the shoan, but this is going to involve two
Speaker 1: definitions of possession, and some Christians are going to be
Speaker 1: very ill at ease with one of the two definitions.
Speaker 1: But I'll just define them and you can go where
Speaker 1: you want. Of course, one is called discarnate possession, and
Speaker 1: I'll define that, and the other one is demon possession.
Speaker 1: Now this is interesting. I can only guess what's in
Speaker 1: this man's mind, this doctor, the medical doctor. But uh,
Speaker 1: Stevenson makes the comment, of those two options, discarnate and demon,
Speaker 1: I don't prefer the demon one, and I'm thinking, wow,
Speaker 1: let me think through this. You already believe in the supernatural,
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, I you know, I believe in reincarnation. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you're already open to the supernatural, and you think
Speaker 1: there is a supernatural slash spiritual realm. Yeah, you don't
Speaker 1: like demon possession though, No, he could say, well, that's
Speaker 1: a Christian view. Well, that's it's not true. You can
Speaker 1: find demon possession in many world religions, I mean major ones.
Speaker 1: But he could say yeah, and I'm just guessing her Sean,
Speaker 1: I don't know, but he could say, demon possession implies
Speaker 1: a satan, and whether or not you believe in a satan,
Speaker 1: there's probably a hell or a bad place to go.
Speaker 1: And that's the my religion doesn't believe that. I think
Speaker 1: he's rejecting it for a damnation slash judgment slash you know, okay,
Speaker 1: and Christianity again is not the only one that believes that.
Speaker 1: But he does say that's not my favorite. Now here's
Speaker 1: the one that's going to cause some trouble. I think, okay,
Speaker 1: just discard it. Possession d I s c A r
Speaker 1: n A TE discarnate possession. Discarnate possession is the possession
Speaker 1: of one individual by a second, previously deceased individual. But
Speaker 1: they're both human beings and person a after death can enter.
Speaker 1: Now again, what's what's the what you know, what definition
Speaker 1: you're going to use. But if you believe in reincarnation,
Speaker 1: you want him to enter another body between conception and birth.
Speaker 1: If you like the what we might call more of
Speaker 1: a Western Christian Jewish discardate view. Not too many people
Speaker 1: talk about this, but it would be after that person's birth.
Speaker 1: So it sounds a little bit like demon possession, but
Speaker 1: it's possession by another individual. And you tell me whether
Speaker 1: you want to go any further. But here's the only
Speaker 1: thing I want to say about it. We'd say, no,
Speaker 1: God doesn't let one a deceased spirit into the body
Speaker 1: of another one. And I'd say, how do you know that?
Speaker 1: And they'd say, well, Hebrews chapter nine says it's a
Speaker 1: you know, it's a point that that man wants to die.
Speaker 1: And after the judgment, Well, I think that's kind of
Speaker 1: an odd verse. It might be your best shot. But
Speaker 1: which judgment do you mean? And if it's the judgment
Speaker 1: at the end of time, golly, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: time between fifty one a d And today. What's been
Speaker 1: going on all those years? And you say, well, I
Speaker 1: don't know. Maybe I can't give you a good verse.
Speaker 1: I just don't think God would allow that. Okay, then
Speaker 1: here's my comeback. Would Satan allow that? With Satan? When
Speaker 1: Paul calls the God of this world, who has a
Speaker 1: lot of power, who could do miracles, who can deceive
Speaker 1: the very elect. Could he let the spirit of a
Speaker 1: person who is his person that he controls? Could he
Speaker 1: mess Christians or others up by having the spirit of
Speaker 1: a dead person enter a living person. All I'm saying is,
Speaker 1: I don't say it's got to be true. But there's
Speaker 1: a number of cult experts all bricked in others, there's
Speaker 1: a number of cult experts who believe you can't rule
Speaker 1: it out. Biblically, there's no problem. So there's two kinds
Speaker 1: human dead human spirit into a live human spirit or
Speaker 1: a demon, and I think it's good to have two options.
Speaker 1: Here's my personal view. I don't think we can rule
Speaker 1: out this carrent possession, at least as the possible province
Speaker 1: of Satan himself over with regard to one of his minions.
Speaker 1: He lets all kinds of strange things happen, even blaspheming God.
Speaker 1: This isn't even that bad. So what's wrong with that? Well,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I just don't like it. Well, maybe
Speaker 1: you don't, But how do you dismiss it?
Speaker 2: You know, my mind is run wild with theological questions
Speaker 2: about discarnate possession. But let me hold that for a minute,
Speaker 2: I want to make sure that our viewers are tracking
Speaker 2: with a point. So Ian Stevenson gives at least, you
Speaker 2: say it, at least five different lines of evidence for reincarnation.
Speaker 2: One of the strongest pieces are the multiple cases of
Speaker 2: children who have specific detail about names and places people live,
Speaker 2: activity that they did, and they discovered that it lines
Speaker 2: up and is likely true. You're convinced that at least
Speaker 2: something supernatural is taken here. And I say that because
Speaker 2: sometimes as Christians, when we see hear miracles in other
Speaker 2: religions like Islam and in say Mormonism, we can either
Speaker 2: explain and say no, it's false, miracle didn't happen, or
Speaker 2: explain away by supernatural forces arguably demonic. But in this case,
Speaker 2: in this line of reasoning, and you argue, there's enough
Speaker 2: here to make you think at least something supernatural is taken.
Speaker 2: Is that fair insofar as it goes most likely.
Speaker 1: But in that chapter I give about twenty reputations. I
Speaker 1: have three, well, I have at least two major ones.
Speaker 1: If you want to count to two different kinds of possessions,
Speaker 1: now I have three. I have a bunch of little
Speaker 1: ones that just throw monkey wrenches into the reincarnation and
Speaker 1: one of them, here's a couple.
Speaker 2: Of them, hang on before before we come back, we're
Speaker 2: going to come to those critiques. And that's fair. But
Speaker 2: I want to draw out for people that say we
Speaker 2: have a murder suspect and we actually let's say we
Speaker 2: have a murder and we have two suspects that we're
Speaker 2: curious about this murder. Both wear size two tennis shoes. Well,
Speaker 2: then we can't say, oh, suspect A wear size ten shoes,
Speaker 2: so this is evidence for suspect A, but not suspect B.
Speaker 2: It minim fits both. Well, if that's the case for
Speaker 2: murder trout when it comes to reincarnation, you're saying, even
Speaker 2: if this is supernatural, we're in come to your other
Speaker 2: critiques of it to show that you're not convinced. But
Speaker 2: even if it is, there's another suspect or two, namely
Speaker 2: that wear size two tennis shoes that can also explain
Speaker 2: the data. So it's not as forceful for reincarnation as
Speaker 2: somebody you would think it is. Does that sum up
Speaker 2: how you look at it?
Speaker 1: That's fair because in logic, or in a lesser subject
Speaker 1: than straightforward logic, but in a good persuasive reasoning. If
Speaker 1: you can get in there and rip that up, you
Speaker 1: might say, yeah, but what you're raising is the case
Speaker 1: of special pleading. You're not asking all the people you're
Speaker 1: going to size too. Here's the second guy with size two,
Speaker 1: And I could say, well, I did some research and
Speaker 1: some of the people in the group you're talking about,
Speaker 1: there's ten of them. I mean, after a while, you're
Speaker 1: really playing with that thesis. I also would raise questions
Speaker 1: like natural hypotheses. Why can't we raise natural hypotheses like
Speaker 1: this one? Well, these are cultures that almost always these
Speaker 1: occurr in cultures where either reincarnation in general is allowed
Speaker 1: or believe in, or they're Indian or maybe Buddhist cultures,
Speaker 1: but especially Indian cultures. If the parent wants your child,
Speaker 1: their child to be a star witness, why can't the
Speaker 1: parent do some research, pass it on to the child,
Speaker 1: get it into his mind. So he says, no, my
Speaker 1: name's Peter. No, come on, we named you Sam. Now
Speaker 1: the kid might spill the beans if he said, yeah,
Speaker 1: but you told me to tell everybody my name's Peter.
Speaker 1: The parents or somebody else could do research. See, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of these families where they affirm this, they
Speaker 1: can't give me exactly. In Christian circles, apologists aren't going
Speaker 1: to buy this. Is what I'm going to say. Here
Speaker 1: is a great evidence. But we pray for healing, and
Speaker 1: we see a healing in church, and we see a
Speaker 1: case maybe where this healing wasn't totally what we prayed for,
Speaker 1: but it prayed in a few it was fulfilled in
Speaker 1: a few areas, so we would and they were good areas.
Speaker 1: So we'll put those in the back burner. But it's
Speaker 1: not a one to one relationship. Maybe the parents do
Speaker 1: a little bit of research and teach the child why
Speaker 1: that's trickery. No, it's them believing in their own religion,
Speaker 1: and we do that as Christians. We do that as
Speaker 1: Christian parents. I just think there's alternative reasons. So I
Speaker 1: wouldn't say it has to be supernatural, but I would
Speaker 1: say for many people, both views are going to involve supernatural.
Speaker 2: Yes, that's really fair. So we're going to look at
Speaker 2: some of your critiques of re incarnation. There's some plausible
Speaker 2: naturalistic explanations. But even if it is supernatural, it doesn't
Speaker 2: uniquely point to exactly. Reincarnation still can be explained away
Speaker 2: with another phenomena. Now, before we get to some of
Speaker 2: your critique, one of the interesting things is how much
Speaker 2: this comes up in studies of near death experiences. Now,
Speaker 2: you were on I don't know three five months ago
Speaker 2: talking about how you've studied near death experiences since the seventies,
Speaker 2: really about five decades, and as you well know, the
Speaker 2: moment I talk about this, one of the biggest objections
Speaker 2: that comes up is people talk about, well, it points
Speaker 2: towards reincarnation. In fact, some studies suggests that NDEs tend
Speaker 2: to increase belief in reincarnation. What's your response to that concern.
Speaker 1: I think that that's true, and I think that it
Speaker 1: involves some kind of overly easy reasoning. I don't think.
Speaker 1: I don't I can't think of any Now I can
Speaker 1: tell you we have a problem here with Peter, because
Speaker 1: he can go to that house and point things out.
Speaker 1: So we got something we got to deal with. I
Speaker 1: don't think indies have anything like that. I can tell
Speaker 1: you if you want me to say it. I don't
Speaker 1: want to get you off the subject, but I can
Speaker 1: tell you why. I don't don't trust that kind of
Speaker 1: Indie data. So the kind of data, you'd have to say.
Speaker 1: Here's the easy comment. Anybody who reads any of my
Speaker 1: stuff on indies. The distinction I make, probably more than
Speaker 1: any other one, is I only accept with very few exceptions.
Speaker 1: There are a couple exceptions, but they don't come close
Speaker 1: to reincarnation. But my argument is I only accept evidential
Speaker 1: cases that are this worldly evidence that is produced so
Speaker 1: the person's hopefully there's dozens of cases. Now I measurably
Speaker 1: got to put that in there, as far as we know,
Speaker 1: a measurably flat heart, flat brain state, and they report
Speaker 1: something in the physical world out there, so to speak,
Speaker 1: and we've got data for it. The easiest way to
Speaker 1: say it, let's say you're lecturing, I'll make it you
Speaker 1: sea instead of me, and you pass out on the floor,
Speaker 1: and the emergency people come in and they know what
Speaker 1: time you went down because somebody looked at their watch.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of students in the class. He went
Speaker 1: down to about twelve oh three, okay, and they get
Speaker 1: you situated at four oh five. But let's say there's
Speaker 1: a car accident five miles away, ten miles away, and
Speaker 1: you have a reason to be interested in that because
Speaker 1: maybe your family member was in a car accident, so
Speaker 1: you're drawn to that, and the the accident happened at
Speaker 1: two oh three, and it got reconciled at three to three,
Speaker 1: so all the data were in the space where you
Speaker 1: had no brain or heart research. Now, to me, it's
Speaker 1: this worldly stuff of that nature. But I don't I
Speaker 1: don't trust, I don't cite. This goes back to the
Speaker 1: beginning of my studies. I don't think there's much evidence
Speaker 1: for these kind of things. Well, first I was here
Speaker 1: and I saw the trees in the mountains. But then
Speaker 1: I zipped up to heaven. And by the way, not
Speaker 1: that many people go down tunnels, but a fair number,
Speaker 1: not even fifty percent, but they go up there and
Speaker 1: they go I met Jesus and he hugged me, and
Speaker 1: he said, you're going to come back here someday, but
Speaker 1: not now. And then you got the guy who says,
Speaker 1: what saw the forest and the trees and went up
Speaker 1: to heaven and I saw Jesus, what are you? Well,
Speaker 1: I'm an agnostic or I'm a Hindu or whatever. And
Speaker 1: Jesus hugged me and said, I'm going to be here
Speaker 1: in a little while or some years for now, but
Speaker 1: not now. Whoa does that mean in the east teach
Speaker 1: other religions or pluralism. Now the problem is I can
Speaker 1: see that you know this event that happened in the
Speaker 1: woods around the mountain, or the car accident, But how
Speaker 1: do you know you saw Jesus? Well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: Did he say it was Jesus? No, it was just
Speaker 1: to be that was all a light being. That was
Speaker 1: just the holiest thing I ever saw and infused me
Speaker 1: and it was really impressive. He never told you that. No,
Speaker 1: what if he did tell you his name of Jesus,
Speaker 1: that make it true? What's your evidence for that? None?
Speaker 1: How do you know you were even in heaven? Well
Speaker 1: that's what it seemed like to me. Now see the
Speaker 1: evidence is starting to get a little weaker. And I
Speaker 1: don't make world view decisions based on quote unquote heavenly
Speaker 1: data that people see. And they're the only witness, and
Speaker 1: they're gonna come back and be the only interpreter. So
Speaker 1: they're the only witness. They're the only interpreter. Everybody goes,
Speaker 1: that's really cool. And if you really saw the car
Speaker 1: accident five miles away, you must have met Jesus too.
Speaker 1: I don't think that follows it all. So I don't think,
Speaker 1: I don't think indes, I don't think the worldview specific
Speaker 1: I think a Hindu could use it as evidence for
Speaker 1: the afterlife, and a Christian could use it as the
Speaker 1: evidence like intelligent design or fine tuning.
Speaker 2: That a kind of natural revelation. And so, by the way,
Speaker 2: just a side note, I've done I don't know, maybe
Speaker 2: ten or twelve shows on this, and different NDE researchers
Speaker 2: will give varying degrees of confidence in testimony that people
Speaker 2: have during an NDE. But your position is you only
Speaker 2: consider evidential when somebody claims to have some experience, then
Speaker 2: we can come back and actually confirm it. That's where
Speaker 2: it's evidentially significant, and so points towards things like life
Speaker 2: after death, the existence of the soul, but not the
Speaker 2: particulars of Christian theology or any other view of theology.
Speaker 2: That's where you would land. Fair enough, go ahead. Did
Speaker 2: you want to add something.
Speaker 1: To that, well, I would add a second argument too.
Speaker 1: A good friend of both of our, Steve Miller, on
Speaker 1: your show. He probably I haven't seen your whole broadcast,
Speaker 1: I've seen part of it, But did he describe his
Speaker 1: little test he did where he studied one hundred indiease
Speaker 1: and to end ind and he and this is from
Speaker 1: a worldwide in the East site. And so you got Hindus,
Speaker 1: you got Buddhists, you got Muslims, you got Christians. And
Speaker 1: I'd have to go back and check his data. In fact,
Speaker 1: I think I did. I think this is the book
Speaker 1: I did the forward for I should be a little
Speaker 1: clearer on this, but I think what happened was that
Speaker 1: the Buddhists never say they saw Buddha, the Hindus never
Speaker 1: say they saw Krishna. Muslims never mentioned the my named Muhammad.
Speaker 1: And they're going to say, well, that's because muhammadah is
Speaker 1: not a god anyway. So okay, I understand. But he's
Speaker 1: and he's got twenty cases out of one hundred one
Speaker 1: fifth where they said they saw Jesus. A number of
Speaker 1: those people are not or not Christians. So non Christians say,
Speaker 1: Jesus talk to me, and the ones who are other
Speaker 1: religions don't even say their founder talk to them. Is
Speaker 1: a general rule. So he uses that. I don't think
Speaker 1: Steve says that proves that all the other religions are on. No,
Speaker 1: Steve doesn't go there, but he says it shoots the
Speaker 1: definition that nds argue for other religions, or that it
Speaker 1: leads people to the east. I think it leads people
Speaker 1: to the east who are not not paying attention to
Speaker 1: the evidence. Real strictly, that's fair too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, when I interviewed him, I don't remember the exact numbers,
Speaker 2: but that sounds accurate that Jesus overwhelmingly appears across worldview,
Speaker 2: across culture in the preliminary study that he did very carefully,
Speaker 2: which suggests that's representative of the vast majority of near
Speaker 2: death experiences, which would challenge if we allow people's testimonies
Speaker 2: into the record of what they experience an ND, it
Speaker 2: would nonetheless challenge the reincarnation notion. All right, fair enough, now,
Speaker 2: you cided earlier, and I cut you off because I
Speaker 2: was holding until we got there about how you have
Speaker 2: some additional challenges just to reincarnation in itself. And here's
Speaker 2: kind of a way you asked the question, I'll put
Speaker 2: out there and then you can run the direction you
Speaker 2: want to. In your chapter, you say, how do we
Speaker 2: bridge the gap between an individual's detailed knowledge pertaining to
Speaker 2: a person who lived in the past and the assumption
Speaker 2: that the two people are one and the same. Really
Speaker 2: interesting point. Maybe expand on that point or just the
Speaker 2: general other critiques you have with the evidence for reincarnation.
Speaker 1: Now I lost you on the first one, Sean. You said,
Speaker 1: I get the people who who remember they claimed that
Speaker 1: when my name was Peter and I grew up in
Speaker 1: this house in my bedroom was a third Okay, I
Speaker 1: get that, But what was the other side, what was
Speaker 1: the other view?
Speaker 2: Well, the quote says, how do we bridge the gap
Speaker 2: between an individual's detailed knowledge pertraying pertaining to a person
Speaker 2: that lived in the past and the assumption that the
Speaker 2: two people are one and the same?
Speaker 1: Okay, I think that was the phrase. How does in
Speaker 1: the past come into this? That phrase in the past,
Speaker 1: how are you using that?
Speaker 2: Umm, I'm quoting you on this one. So rather than
Speaker 2: getting lost in the quote itself, maybe just raise the
Speaker 2: critique that you have of us relying upon reincarnation in general.
Speaker 1: Okay, So this little boy has what we would call
Speaker 1: evidence for something by claiming to be Peter. Go into
Speaker 1: the house, third bedroom on the right, Nosa's parents' name.
Speaker 1: It can even take you to this, let's make it
Speaker 1: more complicated, even take you to the cemetery where Little
Speaker 1: Peter was buried. Okay, there's some evidence, and compare that
Speaker 1: to what an Indie yar who reports a car accident
Speaker 1: ten ten miles away or were not even talking about
Speaker 1: Indie years here.
Speaker 2: Uh, you can bring it in if you want to.
Speaker 2: We're talking about your other problems and challenges with the
Speaker 2: evidence for re incarnation.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, yeah, okay. On the car accident, the best
Speaker 1: kind of case would be if you didn't have any
Speaker 1: brain or heart measurable brain or heart waves during that point,
Speaker 1: and there's a police report on the accident, and nobody
Speaker 1: in your vicinity could have been ten miles away at
Speaker 1: that same time watching the accident. And of course the
Speaker 1: closer you report it. If you report this within an
Speaker 1: hour of waking up or ten minutes, there are some
Speaker 1: a lot of close cases like that. You're not going
Speaker 1: to have been scanning the newspapers and reading about car accidents.
Speaker 1: But if the thing happens in between that time. The
Speaker 1: problem I have with the little boy is multifaceted. I
Speaker 1: think the best critique is this, I will take either
Speaker 1: discarnate possession or demon possession. And even Ian Stevenson himself
Speaker 1: says these are almost toss ups. I don't like. I'm
Speaker 1: talking for Stevenson. Now, I don't like demon possession, but
Speaker 1: discarnate is a toughie, and I think it's a good
Speaker 1: rival position. So, by the way, another reincarnation is Diortega
Speaker 1: says demon possession is the best hypothesis and he believes
Speaker 1: in reincarnation. So and that's on the same page there
Speaker 1: in the book. You can look it up. And still
Speaker 1: another one Maharaj, Now this would be what you're asking for,
Speaker 1: because a lesser comeback. He's he's Indian and he used
Speaker 1: to be an Indian guru and he was converted. In fact,
Speaker 1: his book came under a couple of titles, but the
Speaker 1: first one was an intriguing title. It's called The Death
Speaker 1: of a Guru. And that's when he became a Christian.
Speaker 1: And he says, I'll tell you what. I'll read his statement.
Speaker 1: Just books. My book's opened, Dean Stevenson, and it's right there.
Speaker 1: Maharaj says this. He says he describes his the experience
Speaker 1: as this. This is when he was a budding young guru. Quote.
Speaker 1: My world was filled with spirits and gods and occult powers,
Speaker 1: and my obligation from childhood was to give each its
Speaker 1: due end quote. Now that's a good argument to me
Speaker 1: from a Hindu for demon possession, because they believe in
Speaker 1: demon possession too. See, it's not just a Christian thing
Speaker 1: or a Jewish thing, it's he believes that. And he
Speaker 1: said we were into the cult, and you know his
Speaker 1: other things. Here he says, my obligation for childhood was
Speaker 1: for a cult and spirits and God, small g I'm
Speaker 1: going to give my due to all these things. So
Speaker 1: if you say, all right, these folks are largely Indians
Speaker 1: or those cultures. Yeah, and you're raised and you were
Speaker 1: immersed in the occult, or at least very much into it,
Speaker 1: unfamiliar with the spirits and demons and so on, I
Speaker 1: think that makes demon possession a much likelier thesis and
Speaker 1: that culture. Because I don't object to discarnate possession. I
Speaker 1: would say, just a little person gets I'll give you
Speaker 1: some other ones. But here's here's the the combat I
Speaker 1: would make, and that is if Stevenson of all guys
Speaker 1: says these things are one two, I mean, I don't
Speaker 1: even know who's one and who's two. Sometimes it's sometimes
Speaker 1: it's uh. I think it's possession sometimes it might be discarnate,
Speaker 1: I mean reincarnation or discarnate. I think we don't even
Speaker 1: have to go any further. I think, if the if
Speaker 1: these are the options two kinds of possession, if the
Speaker 1: person in your audience says, now I don't do that
Speaker 1: discarnate stuff, let me do demon. Okay, fine, you've got
Speaker 1: demon versus reincarnation. I think we've got demon and discard,
Speaker 1: aren't it versus reincredation? But now here's my question. All right,
Speaker 1: you're Hindu, yep, and you believe these things yep. And
Speaker 1: you think some kind of possession is a good thesis yep.
Speaker 1: Your main man got your main guy does. And here's
Speaker 1: another guy who thinks it's mostly demon possession is better yep.
Speaker 1: Seems to me like this is a battle for world views.
Speaker 1: And now you know where I'm going to go. What
Speaker 1: is your data for Hindu hindu Is? And I'll match
Speaker 1: you one for one. Good arguments for Christianity? Okay, I
Speaker 1: think Christianity's got the best arguments by far. I think,
Speaker 1: for example, just give you one example. This is why
Speaker 1: critics think the Gospel of John is late at plus
Speaker 1: sixty five, and they don't complain about Buddha at plus
Speaker 1: six hundred. They're just not They're just not tough on
Speaker 1: the world religions, but they're tough on Christianity. Why even
Speaker 1: they recognize we have really good data. So if you
Speaker 1: want to go just at one conclusion alone, one type
Speaker 1: of possession compared to prepared to rec nation, I'm going
Speaker 1: to say, if my worldviews got the best data and
Speaker 1: you have very little data that we think would be
Speaker 1: recognized empirically or otherwise, I think case dismissed. I think
Speaker 1: possession wins. And if you've got two cases of reincarnation
Speaker 1: of possession, I think we really win. Now, let me
Speaker 1: give you some sub arguments that I think are really helpful. Here.
Speaker 1: Ian Stevenson does this, and he goes, yeah, a couple
Speaker 1: of places. He says, I think possession and I gonna
Speaker 1: watch clipping my words around here. I think possession and
Speaker 1: reincarnation are really really tight. And then you go. He goes,
Speaker 1: but I'll give you. I'll talk to you about two
Speaker 1: cases and I go, well, please do. And he gives
Speaker 1: two cases where reincarnation does not work but possession does,
Speaker 1: and in both cases via his definition that we that
Speaker 1: we handled at the outset here. The problem is this
Speaker 1: child wasn't infested by a renegade spirit in between concession,
Speaker 1: conception and birth the person whose spirit Peter. If we
Speaker 1: went back to the Indian case, the one saint Peter,
Speaker 1: Peter died when the little boy was four and now
Speaker 1: he's eight. Now Sam is eight. But see if Peter
Speaker 1: died when he's four, and Sam can say, well, I
Speaker 1: know where he lived and I know where his bedroom
Speaker 1: was in Da Da Da Da Da Da, it's not
Speaker 1: it's not reincarnation because the kid was alive and died
Speaker 1: before the second one started claiming this. It doesn't even
Speaker 1: even Stevenson says, here, here's a couple of things that
Speaker 1: you know, just look like that's one. Here's a couple others.
Speaker 1: What about the marks on the shoulder or similar wounds.
Speaker 1: That's kind of intriguing.
Speaker 2: Okay, hold that thought for a second. I'm gonna come
Speaker 2: back to like the birthmarks and the xeno glossy. Let
Speaker 2: me jump in and clarify for people, this is really important.
Speaker 2: So certain evidence is put forward for reincarnation, and what
Speaker 2: you're saying is minimally that same evidence can be explained
Speaker 2: within a Christian worldview. We're not inventing an explanation either
Speaker 2: demon possession, oppression, deincarnation. We have the resources to account
Speaker 2: for that. But the flip side is we have additional
Speaker 2: evidence for resurrection and for christian as a whole that
Speaker 2: cannot be explained in the way reincarnation can be explained
Speaker 2: on the other side. So if we start with the
Speaker 2: reincarnation data, that alone is not going to solve it.
Speaker 2: It's going to be interpreted somewhat by somebody's worldview. So
Speaker 2: now we have to have to step back and look
Speaker 2: at the scientific, philosophical, historical evidence as a whole for
Speaker 2: a particular worldview. And that's where you say, let's have
Speaker 2: that conversation. We have the additional evidence for Christianity that
Speaker 2: other faiths don't. Now is that a fair summary.
Speaker 1: Let me give you a good sports illustration of it. Ken.
Speaker 1: What if we say the best two quarterbacks in the
Speaker 1: NFL are A and B. They're the best quarterbacks. The
Speaker 1: only problem is A also has the best team around him.
Speaker 1: This guy that got the best defense in the league,
Speaker 1: that got a great offense. What does B have? Well,
Speaker 1: I hate to say this, he's kind of tied for
Speaker 1: the best quarterback, but they've got a lousy team. That's
Speaker 1: kind of what we're saying. I'm not trying to call
Speaker 1: any religion lousy, but I'm saying, whoa wa who. Even
Speaker 1: the best quarterback needs good wide receivers, needs a great
Speaker 1: blocking line. We both know examples where it's a great
Speaker 1: quarterback but the line can't keep anybody out. Guys running
Speaker 1: the whole time, or you want a good running running
Speaker 1: back because a quarterback wants a break. But if the
Speaker 1: other team doesn't have anybody in any of those possessions,
Speaker 1: the quarterback gets beat up all the time, hurt all
Speaker 1: the time. In other words, there's there's two teams of players.
Speaker 1: A star pitcher needs people in other positions around the field.
Speaker 1: So I think it's important if Christianity has star players
Speaker 1: and others, and they say, well, you're just being prejudiced
Speaker 1: for Christians because we don't always all right, just stop
Speaker 1: right there. If you're gonna say I can't play that
Speaker 1: game with you, that's an issue. If you've got a
Speaker 1: good quarterback but no team, where's this conversation going. If
Speaker 1: you've got a great pitcher throws the ball well over
Speaker 1: one hundred miles an hour but has no great team
Speaker 1: and your catcher's always passing the ball. What's going on?
Speaker 1: So I think it's really important if it comes right
Speaker 1: down to it. And remember the key here is Stevenson.
Speaker 1: It's basically a draw or close to a draw, all right.
Speaker 1: When it's a draw from the top reincarnation, guys, you've
Speaker 1: gotta ask what is teams like to use those illstrations.
Speaker 2: You can always use sports illstrations in the carry.
Speaker 1: I love it.
Speaker 2: That helps good stuff. I'm gonna come back to some
Speaker 2: of your critique of a xenoglossy which you mentioned earlier
Speaker 2: and the birthmarks, but first let's pause from it. I
Speaker 2: know at this point some people are probably thinking about
Speaker 2: the biblical evidence that's sometimes given. So for example, in
Speaker 2: Matthew seventeen, verses ten through thirteen, the disciples ask Jesus
Speaker 2: the prophecy that Elijah must come before the Messiah, and
Speaker 2: Jesus identifies the Elijah as John the Baptist, and of
Speaker 2: course the other early Gospels make that connection as well.
Speaker 2: Herod also responds to the fame of Jesus by saying,
Speaker 2: this is John the Baptist. He has been raised from
Speaker 2: the dead. That is why these miraculous powers are at
Speaker 2: work with him? Is this reincarnation in the biblical text?
Speaker 1: And I would say absolutely not for this reason. Not
Speaker 1: necessarily because I can say, oh, this Greek word means
Speaker 1: not the same, but doing similar things. I'm not I
Speaker 1: can't always solve the you know, first of all, I'm
Speaker 1: not primarily a language scholar. I told my PhD. SuDS
Speaker 1: I got a minor in Greek and that makes me dangerous.
Speaker 1: That doesn't make me a Greek scholar. So I can't
Speaker 1: point to a certain thing here, like a word. But
Speaker 1: I can tell you this. I want to know whether
Speaker 1: Jesus is saying they're similar or they're the same, which
Speaker 1: one because in logic we know similarity does not prove sameness.
Speaker 1: Two things can be similar, it doesn't. You can think
Speaker 1: of a bunch of ludicrous examples. Two quarterbacks. I've just
Speaker 1: heard of two quarterbacks this last week, comparing two of
Speaker 1: the top teams going to nationals. Their statistics are almost identical,
Speaker 1: but they're not the same guy. So what is Jesus saying.
Speaker 1: He's saying this guy's the reincarnation of him. I don't
Speaker 1: think that's justified anywhere in scripture. I don't think you
Speaker 1: can prove the point. And that's just that's one case.
Speaker 1: If that's your best case, I don't mean yours, but
Speaker 1: that's the person's best case. I think there's got to
Speaker 1: be a closer. The grit the bridge has got to
Speaker 1: be a little more solid than yeah, this is Elijah.
Speaker 1: What do you mean? We say that all the time,
Speaker 1: but we don't mean you're literally the other pitcher on
Speaker 1: the team that at your high school. This guy was
Speaker 1: almost as famous. This guy was as famous then as
Speaker 1: you are now. It's an analogy. It's not a one
Speaker 1: to one. Let's put this way. It comes on several
Speaker 1: prob levels. There's no to me, no background philosophical reasons
Speaker 1: or theological reasons that would make the Bible a book
Speaker 1: that teaches reincarnation. And if we have to go to
Speaker 1: two or three cases that could be similarity and not proof.
Speaker 1: I'm not walking on that bridge if that if that
Speaker 1: thing is going over you know, a big valley, I'm
Speaker 1: not working on the bridge because if you told me no, no, no,
Speaker 1: don't go out there, I only meant they were similar
Speaker 1: and yeah, now I'm dead. So it's just not a
Speaker 1: good similarity arguments not the same as sameness. Arguments, and
Speaker 1: you'd have to tell me that James, that Jesus meant
Speaker 1: they're the same people.
Speaker 2: This is you're teaching us, like a basic hermeneutical principle,
Speaker 2: If you have a contested passage, you look at it
Speaker 2: in light of the whole. And clearly, the Gospel of Matthew,
Speaker 2: arguably the most Jewish of the Gospels, was pulling from
Speaker 2: who God is and the Old Testament scriptures and death
Speaker 2: and judgment. And so we're gonna interpret this contested passage
Speaker 2: that through the lens of what else Matthew and Judaism taught. Now,
Speaker 2: if we had independent, reasonably reincarnation was true, then this
Speaker 2: passage we can maybe interpret in light of it, but
Speaker 2: we don't. So that's a really good hermonucule approach. The
Speaker 2: other thing I throw in there is when they ask
Speaker 2: the disciples, you know the prophecy that Elijah must come
Speaker 2: before the Messiah. Are they saying Elijah will come back
Speaker 2: from the dead or an Elijah type figure will analogy?
Speaker 2: And it's an analogy. Now, of course, Elijah shows up
Speaker 2: with Moses in Mark nine and I think Luke nine
Speaker 2: and the transfiguration, But that's a different point. That's being
Speaker 2: asked here, it's an analogy, not saying he'll come. So
Speaker 2: that's where reincarnation is reading so much into this passage
Speaker 2: that's obviously not there. So let me ask you this, Gary,
Speaker 2: Is there a way to make reincarnation compatible with Christianity
Speaker 2: or are they completely incompatible belief systems?
Speaker 1: Let me ask a question. We don't have much for
Speaker 1: reincarnation in the Bible. We have a couple passages that
Speaker 1: are odd passages. But you might have mentioned one. It's
Speaker 1: not a strong contradiction, and you weren't using it that way.
Speaker 1: But I'm saying it's a mild contradiction. And it's this
Speaker 1: and Mark nine where Jesus with the sermon I mean
Speaker 1: the transfiguration, and these two Old Testament saints appear before Jesus.
Speaker 1: Jesus doesn't say, what's the problem here? This is Elijah, okay,
Speaker 1: who is Jesus's cousin John the Baptist. They're distinct people.
Speaker 1: Jesus treats them distinctly, and Jesus doesn't say, oh, this
Speaker 1: is the guy that was dead where his physical figure
Speaker 1: is my seemingly cousin, but he's not really my cousin.
Speaker 1: I mean Elijah's already there, and Jesus doesn't say, See,
Speaker 1: I told you he'd come before John the Baptist. See,
Speaker 1: if we wanted to, we could say this, Wow, darn,
Speaker 1: Elijah did come before Jesus. Have you ever read Mark nine?
Speaker 1: He came on the mountain. He came before Jesus. Did
Speaker 1: you know? Before death and resurrection? But you're right. The
Speaker 1: main problem is there's not a body of data that
Speaker 1: make reincarnation true. So to jump into a view that
Speaker 1: is so incredible and deep with all kinds of things
Speaker 1: where Peter can go to his home and go down
Speaker 1: the hallway and turn to the right, I mean John
Speaker 1: doesn't talk like that of anybody. Jesus doesn't talk like
Speaker 1: that of anybody. You think we'd find a lot of
Speaker 1: verses like that. So I'm gonna go with assimilation, not sameness.
Speaker 1: To me, you said Hermaeneutics, and you're right. It's also
Speaker 1: a logical principle. In this case. Sameness does not prove identity.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. Similarity does not prove identity. So is.
Speaker 2: Reincarnation compatible with Christianity or is it incompatible as a
Speaker 2: belief system?
Speaker 1: I think it's incompatible, and I can give you a
Speaker 1: lot of reasons for it. Early in the chapter and
Speaker 1: throughout I do other things like this. These are two
Speaker 1: completing world views. It's a largely it's an Eastern view
Speaker 1: and a Western view. And what what's at stake? Okay,
Speaker 1: the Eastern view is usually not always it's a monism, uh.
Speaker 1: And it's an idealism. Now, a lot of some Christians,
Speaker 1: some well known Christian theologians, are idealists. Jonathan Edwards is
Speaker 1: often called an idealistic philosopher. But for the most part,
Speaker 1: idealism is somebody who's totally or almost everybody there is
Speaker 1: an idealist in Eastern you know, in some sense philosophical idealism,
Speaker 1: and they're doing their monas. No, that's a Judeo Christian view.
Speaker 1: They believe in pluralism, they believe in oh totally. So
Speaker 1: it's a a culture behind them that is totally different.
Speaker 1: Your question was, can reincarnation be interpreted with if I
Speaker 1: understand it right, could it be interpreted within Christianity as
Speaker 1: a part of And I'd say, yeah, their underlying philosophies
Speaker 1: are totally different. What about polytheism versus monotheism. That's a
Speaker 1: huge one. I just don't see how how reincarnation fits
Speaker 1: into a Western Biblical either Judaism or Christianity monotheistic religion.
Speaker 1: The two views I Hinduism and Christianity about as posed
Speaker 1: as you could be as far as having totally different perspectives.
Speaker 2: And that's helpful when we step back again on who
Speaker 2: God is, what God is like, what's wrong with the
Speaker 2: world and how we fix it, the nature of what
Speaker 2: it means to be human, what the after life is like.
Speaker 2: I mean, on the big boulders that define a faith,
Speaker 2: they're distinctly different. So somebody would have to really force
Speaker 2: a puzzle piece into a puzzle that doesn't fit.
Speaker 1: That's yeah, that's your that's your counter argument to my
Speaker 1: not counter But that's your I use baseball and football
Speaker 1: there and use puzzle piece. I think they're both right
Speaker 1: because neither one. The map with so many thousand pieces,
Speaker 1: and the baseball game or the football game, they have
Speaker 1: to fit together. You've got to be a team, and
Speaker 1: in your case, you've got to be a puzzle. If
Speaker 1: the piece doesn't fit the puzzle and the players don't
Speaker 1: fit the team, well, I'm playing soccer, that's what I
Speaker 1: call football. Yeah, it's not going to fit our picture.
Speaker 1: If the if the big pictures aren't that the philosophical
Speaker 1: overview is going to be a huge issue to me.
Speaker 1: So I don't have any reason. I don't have any
Speaker 1: reason to affirm reincarnation. I don't think it's taught in scripture.
Speaker 1: I think there's good alternatives by Stevenson and others, And
Speaker 1: like I said, the other guy says, the other reincarnation says,
Speaker 1: demon possession is a better option better. So now you're
Speaker 1: going to criticize me. Okay, I'm gonna go to my
Speaker 1: worldview and don't forget I'm open to discarnate possession, which
Speaker 1: Stevenson says is the better of the two views. And
Speaker 1: you think that's a real rival to reincarnation. Okay, well
Speaker 1: my thesis I've got, you know, I got two running
Speaker 1: backs and you've got one. Or I've got two big
Speaker 1: home run hitters and you've got one. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: I'm gonna win. I'm just saying odds are with me.
Speaker 2: So two more pieces of evidence that are often given
Speaker 2: for reincarnation. I'll get your take on this one is
Speaker 2: xeno glossy, where people seemingly have the supernatural ability to
Speaker 2: speak another language, and the way This is often interpreted
Speaker 2: with the reincarnation. Is it's the language that their former
Speaker 2: self or identity spoke and is being transformed into them
Speaker 2: them evidence that it's the same soul now in a
Speaker 2: new body. What would your response to that be.
Speaker 1: Just a xeno glossy? Alum, Yeah, okay, well on either
Speaker 1: see to me. Okay, I'm really prejudiced. You're getting me
Speaker 1: going here because I'm going, hey, Sean, if I've got
Speaker 1: discarnate and demon possession, I've got some other issues like
Speaker 1: logic and these other things I mentioned. I'm really kind
Speaker 1: of getting a type view here, and I see your
Speaker 1: view as being kind of loose, you know, the Eastern
Speaker 1: view is like this, and you're going, what about a
Speaker 1: xeno glossy? I'm going, Sean, time out, think about it.
Speaker 1: If this is discarnate possession, it's another person. If it's
Speaker 1: demon possession, it's the demons. Could speak a hundred languages.
Speaker 1: But on my view, I'm surprised someone's not speaking messages
Speaker 1: out you know, other languages. Don't forget when you do
Speaker 1: the when you do spiritual gifts, whatever you I mean.
Speaker 1: I'm open to anything biblically spiritual gifts, but there are
Speaker 1: cases in scripture. For an instance, the little girl who
Speaker 1: followed Paul and and she was wanted to they cast
Speaker 1: the demon out of her, but she was prophesying and
Speaker 1: making all kinds of things when you can do supernatural things.
Speaker 1: They didn't go, whoa, you're one of us, you're doing
Speaker 1: the supernatural. They go, get out of here. That supernatural
Speaker 1: is not from us, and they cast the demon out
Speaker 1: of her. Now is it odd that our thesis demon
Speaker 1: is one of two major counter theories and they didn't
Speaker 1: accept her what she manifested? True? Yeah? Do you have evidence? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Is it of us? No, be gone Satan? You know so.
Speaker 1: I just think that's in both this carnate and possessive cases.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised if there's not other languages.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, that's interesting here you say there's not, And
Speaker 2: of course I've done Separate shows a number with Richard
Speaker 2: Gallagher and people on demonic possession and oppression, and a
Speaker 2: common phenomena is speaking in other languages, which shows something
Speaker 2: supernatural is going on. Yes, which if we're saying that
Speaker 2: this person's not really reincarnated from their spirit in a
Speaker 2: different body, but possession or oppression or deincarnation this is
Speaker 2: exactly what we would expect. It fits with both of those,
Speaker 2: so that that's helpful, That makes sense. What about the
Speaker 2: birthmarks and deformities that somebody seems to have that they
Speaker 2: had in their previous life as well, which seems to
Speaker 2: show some kind of continuity between the two lives.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let me let me give you an actual I
Speaker 1: think objection that's good. But let me also give a
Speaker 1: natural objection that I think is good. I'll give you
Speaker 1: each example. All right, birthmarks, similar marks, deformities. I think
Speaker 1: that here, here's a really good comeback. We hear that psychics.
Speaker 1: Psychics frequently do really interesting things. And one of the
Speaker 1: things that pop up once in a while are the
Speaker 1: marks and the poems and where people produce blood and
Speaker 1: they say, see, I've been blessed. God's whatever with me.
Speaker 1: He's very happy with me. I'm showing the same wounds
Speaker 1: as Jesus does. And my one time of year, whatever
Speaker 1: the story is, one time a year at Easter, I start,
Speaker 1: I start bleeding in the palms in my hand. First
Speaker 1: of all, I got a little bit of a side one.
Speaker 1: Everybody today medical and theological think that the nails would here,
Speaker 1: so they're bleeding, they're bleeding in the wrong place. They're
Speaker 1: not bleeding, They're not bleeding in the right place. But
Speaker 1: give it to him. Be that as it may. Here's
Speaker 1: the comeback. So are you arguing for reincarnation here? I'm
Speaker 1: just saying people show similar marks. Oh ah, so you're Jesus. Right. No,
Speaker 1: I didn't say that. But you've got the marks of
Speaker 1: Jesus on you, the same ones Jesus had, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: are you Jesus? Now, I'm a follower of Jesus, but
Speaker 1: you're not Jesus. No, And I thought this discussion was hilarious.
Speaker 1: You're not Jesus, but you manifest his wounds. I guess
Speaker 1: that means that not all wounds are evidential manifestations of
Speaker 1: the person themselves. If you can have a mark, but
Speaker 1: I can think of a couple of natural theses. If
Speaker 1: parents are in on this, and I don't mean necessarily
Speaker 1: nastily in on it, but the way Christians manipulate things
Speaker 1: sometimes to make it look like their version of Christianity
Speaker 1: is more true or more than yours. Or I've got
Speaker 1: this gift or I've got you know, I'm not picking
Speaker 1: on anybody. I believe sign gifts are here, etcetera. But
Speaker 1: how could what if the parents, you know how in
Speaker 1: that culture fathers choose brides for their daughters. Okay, what
Speaker 1: if the parent works with the other parent. Sam's parent
Speaker 1: works with Peter's all right, to bring him over to
Speaker 1: Peter's house. And the kid we've told him it's the
Speaker 1: bedroom is the one of the room on the right,
Speaker 1: last room on the right. Okay, So I got this
Speaker 1: kid down. He passes all the tests and everything else,
Speaker 1: he goes, he goes in there, but his parents, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you got to you got to mark here. What if
Speaker 1: one of the marks is real but the other mark
Speaker 1: is kind of imagine but the parents make it look
Speaker 1: up that it's it's contrived. What if the wounds are contrived?
Speaker 1: But but I like I like the one about the
Speaker 1: the signs of the cross. The people bleeding have signs
Speaker 1: of the Cross. Nobody says they're Jesus, they're you know,
Speaker 1: so signs don't Again, here's the phrase, uh, similarities do
Speaker 1: not produce sameness. And even if it were true, even
Speaker 1: if it were true, I think the marks on the
Speaker 1: body are one of the least of the evidences. Notice
Speaker 1: I have it down at the end I don't because
Speaker 1: I don't want to answer it. It's because I almost
Speaker 1: think it's not a really good objection. But I'm gonna
Speaker 1: put it any there anyway because they say it's good.
Speaker 1: I just don't find it as an evidence or anything.
Speaker 2: I think that have to be pretty clear, like the
Speaker 2: actual marks on Jesus that he shows Thomas and tells
Speaker 2: him distinctly, rather than vague similarities that could have a
Speaker 2: natural explanation or in some cases even a supernatural one
Speaker 2: apart from reincarnation isn't really really compelling.
Speaker 1: So let me ask you something. We teach both sides
Speaker 1: of the country at two well known Christian schools in
Speaker 1: our traditions, and we both are not one denomination where
Speaker 1: you know everybody and from all over the world. What
Speaker 1: would how good would that similarity have to be? How?
Speaker 1: In some cases, yeah, the closest might be. You know,
Speaker 1: maybe I'm not telling you that I have a mark
Speaker 1: on my shoulder like you did, but I also have
Speaker 1: one of those on my left knee and one of
Speaker 1: them on the top of my I just have these
Speaker 1: kind of mark What I mean is to me, they're
Speaker 1: just natural theses all over the place. Now, if you
Speaker 1: have a really good one, like he's I don't know
Speaker 1: what a really good one would be. But here's my
Speaker 1: other question from the greater picture that we've been developing. Here,
Speaker 1: can demons make marks on bodies and duplicate? And could
Speaker 1: a discardate personality? I don't know. I'm not as sure
Speaker 1: about the discarnate personality, but I'm sure demons can do that.
Speaker 1: Demons do miracles, right, and Jesus said they would deceive
Speaker 1: the very elect if they could, they would try to
Speaker 1: deceive the elect. Do you think they could try to
Speaker 1: put a mark on your shoulder? I just I just
Speaker 1: think if you get demon in here and Stevenson goes
Speaker 1: fifty to fifty and our Taga goes no, it's that's
Speaker 1: just better. You've let the you let the cat out
Speaker 1: of the bag on this one, because there's no stop
Speaker 1: in it. You've got a supernatural person inside you, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, demon and again the god of this world.
Speaker 1: You know, Jesus said watch out for the miracles, book
Speaker 1: a revelation, watch out for the miracles. I just think
Speaker 1: that I think it could be about anything. That's why
Speaker 1: I don't think the marks are very strong. I think
Speaker 1: on the Christian world view, the marks are could be
Speaker 1: duplicated a lot easier if it's a demon.
Speaker 2: You know, I don't know the line about how specific
Speaker 2: a mark would have to be. This is kind of
Speaker 2: the question of, like the design filter, how do we
Speaker 2: recognize when design is there? And of course if it's
Speaker 2: like a tattoo that matches with a level of specificity,
Speaker 2: wouldn't necessarily prove supernatural if somebody was aware of that
Speaker 2: mark on somebody else before, like, it doesn't really rule
Speaker 2: out the supernatural, maybe suggests it, but even then demons
Speaker 2: could do that. And by the way, if somebody's watched
Speaker 2: this they don't believe in demons or reincarnation, they're going
Speaker 2: to think that two of us are crazy, And that's
Speaker 2: completely fine. All we're trying to show is the evidence
Speaker 2: for reincarnation has another explanation that can account for the data,
Speaker 2: namely demon possession or oppression. So this uniquely doesn't count
Speaker 2: as evidence for the supernatural. And for you and I
Speaker 2: who believe in demons and believe there are liars, like
Speaker 2: Jesus says in the Gospel of John chapter eight, specifically,
Speaker 2: Satan is a liar. Well, if resurrection is as central
Speaker 2: to the Christian faith, as you and I have been arguing,
Speaker 2: and the chief sign that Jesus gave that the Son
Speaker 2: a Man would be in the belly of Jonah for
Speaker 2: three days, then there would be incentive for demons to
Speaker 2: lie about this and convince people who've had supernatural experiences
Speaker 2: to go to the direction of reincarnation rather than resurrection.
Speaker 2: So my point is that I just think it fits
Speaker 2: now before we wrap up anything else that I didn't
Speaker 2: ask you about a critique of reincarnation that you want
Speaker 2: to bring in here, or did we cover We ended
Speaker 2: a pretty decent death.
Speaker 1: Was actually Sean. I talked to a lot of people
Speaker 1: who do a lot of interviews, and you are regularly
Speaker 1: mentioned is one of the best of not the best
Speaker 1: Christian interviewers today. This is typical. You sent me a list.
Speaker 1: How many questions were on my list? Twenty?
Speaker 2: Uh said, yeah, twelve, fifteen plus maybe.
Speaker 1: I read them real quickly, and I thought to myself, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's done his homework because all these are on my chapter.
Speaker 1: It was not anything you know, but I would run
Speaker 1: and make a point here at the very end. It's
Speaker 1: not true or false on reincarnation, but I do have
Speaker 1: here's my final two points we've covered. The one we
Speaker 1: haven't really mentioned. The other one, the one I would
Speaker 1: cover is I don't think this argument is even challenging.
Speaker 1: If you if you said to me, Hey, you're the
Speaker 1: resurrection guy. Your fourth volumes coming on any time. It's
Speaker 1: almost four thousand pages of work on the resurrection. What
Speaker 1: do you think about the hallucination theory? You got great,
Speaker 1: big chapter on it, and you handle it a bunch
Speaker 1: of other places. I'd say, hmm, Sean, that's probably the
Speaker 1: toughest naturalistic theory to deal with. I acknowledge it's kind
Speaker 1: of tough. You go, hey, on a world religious question,
Speaker 1: what do you think about reincarnation, I'd say, Sean, in
Speaker 1: my view, not close. I don't think they're comparable arguments.
Speaker 1: I think that's something to be said. And one of
Speaker 1: the biggest problems is my baseball or football illustration, your
Speaker 1: puzzle illustration. When the whole when the whole world view
Speaker 1: is at odds with each other, and you start talking
Speaker 1: about which world view is right, we're only doing reincarnation.
Speaker 1: On reincarnation, I don't think it's anything to worry about.
Speaker 1: But if you're gonna do big picture on world views,
Speaker 1: don't even start me. You're gonna lose before you start.
Speaker 1: I mean the source over here's to my left by
Speaker 1: a Buddhist PhD. English professor, British professor. He says, we
Speaker 1: don't he's a Buddhist. He says, we don't even know
Speaker 1: what Buddha taught. The earliest sources that I'm in favor
Speaker 1: of are six hundred to eight hundred years after Buddha died. Wow,
Speaker 1: we don't. That's not history. But if that's the source
Speaker 1: you're going to use, we say, you're not even the ballgame.
Speaker 1: And you admitted it. You said you don't have any
Speaker 1: evidences too, Okay on that level, I don't think it's
Speaker 1: a good objection. Here's my last one that we haven't
Speaker 1: really mentioned. I've said this all my life because I'm
Speaker 1: not proud of this, But in my twenty years of doubting,
Speaker 1: I got involved in the occult more than I should have.
Speaker 1: Then I had a leading occult expert who was converted
Speaker 1: from the occult. He was not a Christian. He was
Speaker 1: a leader in a non Christian group. So I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: here's the guy who can answer my questions. And I
Speaker 1: wasn't looking at that time for evidence for christian I
Speaker 1: wish I knew indies in those days, because that's a
Speaker 1: blowaway on almost everything. But I thought the occult might
Speaker 1: give some evidence is for and after life, not necessarily
Speaker 1: for Christianity. So I was asking everything because I wanted
Speaker 1: evidence wherever it could be found. I should never have
Speaker 1: gone there. But this guy scared me to death one
Speaker 1: time because I kept writing letters to him. He was
Speaker 1: a European and he kept answering my objections, and one
Speaker 1: day I wrote him five more questions after I've probably
Speaker 1: written twenty to him over the years. And he was
Speaker 1: at the top of his craft. He could do things
Speaker 1: spiritistically that would make him the apex, one of the
Speaker 1: apex people in the whole world. But he wrote sent
Speaker 1: the letter back to me. I still have it, it's
Speaker 1: in my file, and it scared me to death. Here's
Speaker 1: what he said to me this time, I am not
Speaker 1: going to answer your five questions. I'm not going to
Speaker 1: answer any more of your questions. This guy was converted. Remember,
Speaker 1: he was acting more Christianly than I was. I was
Speaker 1: a pastor Sean and at the time, and he wrote
Speaker 1: back to me and he goes, I will not answer questions,
Speaker 1: and in this sentence you are playing with fire. Oh
Speaker 1: hear me to death. And that letter is in my
Speaker 1: file to this day. Happened thirty years ago, but it's
Speaker 1: in my file, all right. Here's my point. This kind
Speaker 1: of argument, to me, is a backdoor argument for the
Speaker 1: truth of Christianity, just like evidence is for the occult.
Speaker 1: Are backdoor arguments for the Christian worldview. If Satan could
Speaker 1: do the things that Jesus says he can, I e.
Speaker 1: Deceive the very elect if he can do it. If
Speaker 1: Satan does that, and we find out there Satan, we
Speaker 1: find out Satan exists, or we find out that occult
Speaker 1: phenomena exists, and they have compared to reincarnation the occultic stuff.
Speaker 1: I want to talk. I'll give a testimony once a
Speaker 1: while and say stay away from it. It's a page turner.
Speaker 1: But I won't tell you what I was asking. I
Speaker 1: won't tell you what I'm doing because you're too easy
Speaker 1: to get sucked into it. Christians. I don't talk about
Speaker 1: my classes. I just say stay away from it, like
Speaker 1: that guy told me. But it is a backdoor evidence
Speaker 1: for Christianity. If there's a pile of really supernatural evidence
Speaker 1: I don't think reincarnation fits that bill. But if there's
Speaker 1: really backdoor and you start going, whoa Spiritism, it's a
Speaker 1: little more inclusive than Christianity, be a little nicer. But
Speaker 1: that doesn't follow from this stuff. It follows that Satan
Speaker 1: is not God and he's going to be judged. But however,
Speaker 1: it does say that this world is a supernatural world.
Speaker 1: It does say there's spirits, It does say that the
Speaker 1: general Hebrew, even Muslim, that the Islamic, Jewish, Christian worldview
Speaker 1: is generally true with demons and so on. It evidences Christianity.
Speaker 1: And that's the last thing I'd say. If this argument
Speaker 1: is even in the ballpark, and you want to make
Speaker 1: an argument for Hinduism, but you've got data. You know,
Speaker 1: this little fellow tell you whereas the person's buried in
Speaker 1: which room is his? If this is really evidence, he
Speaker 1: didn't learn it from his parents, and we can't explain
Speaker 1: it any other way. But you don't have any other
Speaker 1: ballplayers on your team or puzzle pieces that fit. I
Speaker 1: think that favorites Christianity by a mile. But it is
Speaker 1: a backdoor evidence for Christianity, because in scripture the occult exists.
Speaker 1: That's why in Act sixteen, that's why Paul casts the
Speaker 1: spirit out of the little girl that was doing supernatural things.
Speaker 1: What she was doing was an evidence for Christianity, but
Speaker 1: not because her beliefs were her religion was true. So
Speaker 1: I think that was last thing I'd say things about
Speaker 1: spiritism and Eastern thought. Thank you for giving us one
Speaker 1: more evidence for our position, but it doesn't it doesn't
Speaker 1: challenge us on any kind of evidence that anyway, you're
Speaker 1: legal anywhere near equal.
Speaker 2: Well, I've personally heard and read a lot of stories
Speaker 2: and evidences from me, Gary, but that one you shared
Speaker 2: about the letter is one I have not heard before
Speaker 2: and gave me the hills when you said it as well.
Speaker 2: So bottom line is I agree with you that the
Speaker 2: evidence for reincarnation does not compare to the historical evidence
Speaker 2: for resurrection. The reason to not include it in your
Speaker 2: resurrection volumes is because it doesn't pose a historical challenge.
Speaker 2: But this video is important because on a popular level,
Speaker 2: so many people in America, some who claim to be
Speaker 2: Christians and worldwide, embrace recarnation. So some of you're watching
Speaker 2: this and saying, hey, Ian Stevenson has passed away. He
Speaker 2: used to be the expert, there is new evidence for reincarnation.
Speaker 2: You guys have not considered tag a blow. We will
Speaker 2: take a look at it. I'll talk with Gary and
Speaker 2: maybe we'll do a response to that. So if you
Speaker 2: think there's other pieces of evidence, don't tag a dissertation,
Speaker 2: send us quick articles or points. All take a look
Speaker 2: and if it's there and we need to revisit this,
Speaker 2: I'd be happy to come back. And before you click
Speaker 2: away and make sure you hit subscribe, we've got some
Speaker 2: other shows cut up on resurrection. Near death experience is
Speaker 2: the scientific evidence for God and some of the leading
Speaker 2: Christian scholars and beyond coming on for conversation. You won't
Speaker 2: want to miss it. If you thought about studying poljeics,
Speaker 2: we'd love to have you at Top School Theology online
Speaker 2: or in person. Information below and Gary's you know, we
Speaker 2: have a certificate program. We offer a BIOLA. We've just
Speaker 2: completely updated that and there's this significant discount below. If
Speaker 2: you kind of want to formally study apologetics, aren't ready
Speaker 2: for a masterss with me or a PhD at Liberty,
Speaker 2: take a look at the certificate program. Gary, thanks for
Speaker 2: coming on, and when your next volume four is out,
Speaker 2: we will do a show on that for sure. Always
Speaker 2: appreciate you coming on, and thanks for being a friend
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: You're welcome, Sean. It's a great show. Oh, I enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: I've been looking forward for a long time and I
Speaker 1: think it's your question that largely pulled this thing off.
Speaker 1: You directed to the right places that I could not
Speaker 1: have to say, Oh, don't go too far. I've got
Speaker 1: to give you three other points. You just worked a
Speaker 1: write in from the beginning. I think it was fantastic.
Speaker 2: Thanks brother, Hey friends, if you enjoyed this show, please
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