Do you think there is a soul distinct from the body?

This question revealed a puzzle that I had not recognized before. I associated the concept of a soul as relevant only to life after death. By age fifteen, I had come to the determination that life after death had thus far not been proven (whether measured by a preponderance of the empirical evidence, or by beyond a shadow of doubt). Accordingly, it became irrelevant to my existence and I gave it no further thought until I was nearly forty years old.

            The last time that I considered this subject was over forty years ago. I had read a book by Jessie Stern who had placed Taylor Caldwell under hypnosis at which point she had revealed a number of prior lives she had lived covering many centuries and including one in “Atlantis.”. Caldwell refused to accept the conclusion of reincarnation even in the face of the tape-recorded sessions in which she spoke in numerous languages with which she was currently totally unfamiliar. However, each chapter revealing a “new older life” for Caldwell was very convincing to me – so much so that I spent the next three-months reading on the subject before an upcoming trial gained 100% of my attention. After the trial I never returned to reading about reincarnation or life after death. My brain filed it away again as irrelevant to my existence

           I continue to see no point in considering the subject of a “soul” unless it relates to life after death. We know that our body, which includes our brain, does not survive death. Even in the Caldwell recordings, it was evident that in each reincarnation Caldwell did not carry forward all the knowledge from a previous life. In other words, her “soul” did not include an intact mind; otherwise, she would have arrived in each new incarnation fully informed from her previous life.

         On the other hand, at the time we were not familiar with mitochondrial DNA. It has passed with each birth throughout history without any mutations (or changes) for thousands of years. Recent tests indicate that in patients suffering loss of memory, the mitochondrial DNA has declined substantially more than any other forms of DNA. Perhaps it is the physical existence of a “soul.”

         In any event, Caldwell did carry forward “fears” related to adverse events from a previous life (e.g., fear of water in this life after having drowned in a prior life), and certain isolated knowledge from those prior lives. For example, she had displayed a knowledge of medical approaches in Dear and Glorious Physician that were unrecorded in any historical writings prior to her writing the book but were confirmed later through archaeology diggings. In one of her reincarnations, she had been a nurse assisting a surgeon at the early time in history covered in her historical novel where she witnessed the previously unknown surgical procedure described in her book. It was obvious from a life centuries later that she was not consciously carrying forward the totality of her knowledge gained in previous lives. Perhaps her subconscious was informed through mitochondrial DNA.

             If our minds (i.e., brains) are our souls, I think reincarnation seems unlikely. Otherwise, where is Albert Einstein’s new incarnation? He would carry all the knowledge and intellectual capability from before into this lifetime. Or maybe he did return with his mind fully intact even after his death in 1955. Perhaps as Brian Schmidt (born in 1967 in the U.S.) who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2011 for his work, along with two others, in proving that the universe is expanding. Maybe he returned in Takaaki Kajiti (born in 1959 in Japan) the 2015 Nobel recipient for work in neutrino oscillation.

             In the end I continue to think the answer to this question does not matter. It is hard for me to base my life on some unproven, and unknowable, thesis. I prefer, for example, to interpret Jesus’ references to Heaven (according to the transcribers) as being here on Earth during one’s life. Following his guidance provides an inner calmness that enhances life on Earth whether or not it is “necessary” for the continued life of the soul in Heaven after the death of the body.

              Equally true is the irrelevancy of prior lives to the living of this life, unless you are faced with disabling, apparently irrational fears. Hypnosis may reveal that the fear arises from a terrible event in a prior life. However, that is only useful if it allows you to overcome the fear in this life. In other words, even if I believed in reincarnation, I have no curiosity about my prior lives. I have found my current life sufficiently challenging as to command my complete attention.

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