Reincarnation – U.G. Krishnamurthi and Theosophists

I am trying to compile the opinions of different well known people, traditions and movements on Reincarnation and post it  in this blog. I have already posted the views of J Krishnamurthi and Ramana Maharishi on reincarnation. Now it is the turn of the maverick, U.G. Krishnamurthi also called UG.

U.G. Krishnamurthi used to often tell this funny story of how he lost all belief in reincarnation. In his Theosophical days where the belief in reincarnation was rife and according to UG’s funny description the way people used to introduce themselves was - “I was Queen Victoria in my past life. What were you”. UG soon discovered that all the well known historical personalities had been claimed by the members of the Theosophical Soceity. Theosophists were claiming to be reincarnations of historical personages like Alexander, Ashoka, Cleopatra, King Henry, Victoria, Newton, Francis Bacon, Shakesphere, well known Buddhist and Hindu masters, and other writers and poets.  Since UG was left with little choice he could never get any worthy person to claim he was reincarnated from, hence out of frustration he dismissed the idea of reincarnation. Colonel Olcott the co-founder of the theosophical society used to claim that he was the Buddhist Emperor Ashoka in his past birth. UG used to make fun of this fact as to whether this was an evolution or devolution.

C.W. Leadbeater had written a book on the ‘Lives of Alcyone’ (The initiation name of J Krishnamurti). Based on his clairvoyant investigations Leadbeater had written about the many past lives of J Krishnamurti in this book. This book is in three parts and overall it describes the 48 previous lives of Alcyone. Leadbeater goes to the great extent of describing the different cultures in which Alcyone lived in his past lives. There was a great amount of scholarship which went into this book. UG used to wonder how Leadbeater could know such things about the different cultures egyptian, assyrian, european, roman, greek, hindu, buddhist, jain and many many more that he described in that book. Finally he found his answer when he started working with Jinarajadasa and was appointed as a caretaker of Leadbeater’s personal library where UG spent three months rearranging the books. During this time U.G. understood that Leadbeater was a voracious reader of books and UG concluded that ‘He has read all the ancient histories of practically every civilization in the world. No wonder he could fit Krishnamurti’s past lives into these histories.’

 There were also many people who came to know about this aspect of Leadbeater and raised objections. One of the chief critics of Leadbeater was B.P. Wadia, a theosophist and founder of the Indian Institute of world culture in Bangalore. B.P. Wadia found that leadbeater’s knowledge of persian and zorastrian history came from and was limited to a couple of books and he misrepresented many aspects of the culture. Wadia knew better as he was a Parsi and well read in the history of his religion and Persian history and culture.

The Theosophists went on an overdrive in convincing the world about Reincarnation. Notwithstanding all these issues Theosophists created and collected a huge body of knowledge on eastern religions. They created a bridge between eastern mysticism and western occultism. They were responsible for the renewed interest in the western and eastern world towards the eastern religions – Hinduism and Buddhism. And one of the fruits of their efforts is the new age movement.  Theosophists have influenced many well known political and religious personalities from Jawaharlal Nehru to Rudolph stiener to George Gurdjieff. People in the holy business still talk in the terminology created by  the theosophists like the Rays of creation, Monad, Astral bodies, Hidden masters, Lemuria, Atlantis and so on.

UG denied the existence of reincarnation and here are a few excerpts from UG on the subject of reincarnation:

Q: The theory of reincarnation also denies death, but in a different way. They speak of an eternal atma or soul which outlives the physical death …

U.G.: Whatever answers are given regarding death, you are not satisfied with them, and so you must invent theories about reincarnation. What is it that will reincarnate? Even while you are alive, what is there? Is there anything beyond the totality of the knowledge which existed inside you now? So, is there death at all, and if there is, can it be experienced?

U.G.: That is the tradition of India I am talking about — change, not the tradition you talk about, which is no change. Your whole life is a denial of the reality of change. You only wish to continue, somehow, then revive, only to continue. That is not the great tradition of India I am talking of. You think you are asking a profound question when you ask, “What is death?” You presume to ask Gowdapada’s question before you have asked the more fundamental question, “Am I born?” Instead of tackling this basic question on your own, you quote and write commentaries upon Gowdapada, then take the easy way out, and simply equate what I am saying with what he said. That is your cop out.

In any event, all you can do is to speculate about death and reincarnation. Only dead people ask about death. Those who are really living would never ask such a question. That memory in you–which is dead–wants to know if it will continue even after what it imagines to be death. That is why it is asking such silly questions. Death is finality; you are dead only once. When once the questions and ideas you have have died, then you will never ask about death again.

Q: We have been familiar with this theory of birth and death — karma, action, reaction or something that we bring along with us like a bank balance, add something to it, then spend something, and then carry it forward to the next birth or whatever it is. How far do you subscribe to this theory, or are you opposed to it?

U.G.: I am not opposed to the theory of karma or reincarnation. But I am questioning the very foundation of that belief. There is reincarnation for those who believe in it, and there is no reincarnation for those who do not believe in it. But is there any such thing as reincarnation as a law of nature, like gravity and other laws of nature? My answer is, no.

It doesn’t matter whether you believe or not in reincarnation. If one is interested in finding out for himself and by himself, to resolve this problem of reincarnation, and get an answer for this oft-repeated question, “Is there such a thing as reincarnation?” you have to ask this fundamental question, “What is there now that you think will reincarnate?” “Is there anything there? Is there any such thing as soul? Is there any such thing as the ‘I’? Is there any such thing as the psyche? Whatever you see there, whatever you experience there, is created only by the knowledge you have of that self. If you are lucky enough to be freed from the totality of knowledge, the knowledge of the self, reincarnation, and all kinds of things, then is it possible for you to experience any center, any ‘I’, any self, any soul? So, to me the ‘I’ is nothing but a first person singular pronoun, and I do not see any center or self there. So the whole idea of reincarnation is built only on the foundation of our beliefs.

Q: What is it that makes one a great person in due course of time and another stationary, stagnant in his mental processes? Do you attribute this to some kind of inherent gift?

U.G.: We have always been curious and interested in finding out why a child is born with deformities. And reincarnation was a very interesting theory evolved by the human mind at one time to explain away such situations and give us comfort in facing the situation that we have such people in our midst. But now it is possible for us, in the light of what they are doing in terms of genetic research and microbiology, to correct the deformities created by nature. Why should we want to attribute this misfortune to something terrible that we did in our previous life? That kind of belief comes in very handy to us. We have in our midst today a tremendous suffering, a tremendous amount of poverty, starvation, and degradation. It is very comforting for us to believe that that suffering is there because the people who suffer did something terrible in their past life. That is no answer to give. That makes us take shelter in the belief and not do anything to solve the problem there. The belief is neither spiritual nor human. In the name of doing something human to our fellow beings, we have perpetrated inhuman deeds. The belief in reincarnation will only help us to look the other side and not to deal with the problem which is demanding answers from every thinking man in the world today.

 Excerpt from the books ‘Mind is a Myth’ and ‘Thought is your Enemy’

You can read all the books of UG from this site: http://www.well.com/user/jct/