Hans Wilhelm argues that reincarnation was a known and accepted teaching in early Christianity, citing Jesus's identification of John the Baptist with Elijah and the writings of Origen, and traces its disappearance to the political pressure of Emperor Justinian I in the sixth-century Eastern Roman Empire. The framing places the loss in institutional politics rather than theology.
Transcript
hi I am hansim this is the second video in the Life Explain series on the topic of reincarnation in my first video I explained how reincarnation works and in this video I would like to explore with you why this teaching of reincarnation is no longer taught in our churches or religious institutions did you know that more than 50% of people in this world believe in reincarnation yes even here in America our founding fathers Franklin Jefferson Washington all shared an enthusiasm for reincarnation and so did at least a dozen of our presidents if not more well as also the captains of industry like Thomas Edison Henry Ford Paul Getty and many others what many people do not know is that the knowledge of the re-embodiment of the Soul was also known to the early Christians it's mentioned in the bible several times in Matthew and Mark we find passages of how Jesus asked the question who do the people say that I am and his disciples tell him that people think he is John the Baptist Elijah Jeremiah or one of the great prophets who has come back as Jesus and in Matthew Jesus actually explains twice to some of his disciples that John the Baptist has been the Prophet Elijah in a previous lifetime why would Jesus to teach reincarnations to his disciples Jesus was a Jew and so were all his disciples and for many Jews at the time reincarnation was a fact of life it was mentioned in the ancient mystical text of the cabala that teaches the soul cycle also called the gilga nesam mod even today we have several Jewish denominations that believe in reincarnation like the hasidics the Shabbat Niks and other Orthodox Jewish groups we know from the writings of the old church fathers like Oregon that the knowledge of reincarnation was widespread in Christianity in the first few centuries but why is this important component of Christ's teaching no longer mentioned in our churches of today what happened to find the answer to this question we have to go back to the sixth Century to the Eastern Roman Empire you see here the Mediterranean Italy you see Greece turkey and the Middle East now the Eastern Roman Empire at the time was ruled by a very powerful Emperor called Justinian I first he thought himself as the supreme ruler of the church and the pope and even made it a law that nothing could be done in the church contrary to the emperor's will and command he was a real desperate and and to deal with the general War situation in the Eastern Roman Empire and the threatening danger of a domistic political religious war in what is today the Palestine area he commanded that everybody accepted his style of Orthodox Faith which included the removal of the teachings of reincarnation he wanted everybody to believe in one single Lifetime and that the priests or better the church are the mediators for the Salvation of the people think about it you could only go to heaven via the church it was a powerful tool to control the people so it was in the year 543 in Constantinople which of course today is Istanbul that the teachings of reincarnation was going to be banned because of pressure by Emperor Justinian the first it happened during the Cote of the Eastern Church a gathering of Bishops but Pope vielas knew it was against Christ's teachings and he strongly opposed the emperor and refused to sign this ban but nobody can contradict an emperor for long so 10 years later on the morning of december8 553 under severe pressure by the emperor the pope finally relented and made it a law at the general Council in Constantinople it wasn't even discussed at the council now but this caused a big problem for the church they no longer could explain the basic questions of life where do we come from why are we here and where do we go so they had to invent totally new dogmas to fill the gap of reincarnation for instance they came up with things like the original sin the creation of the Soul at the time of conception mortal sin the Judgment Day purgatory and eternal Nation none of this was taught by Jesus but Justinian the first didn't care after all he was the ruler of the church and the pope and he made the rules unfortunately all Christians denominations that later split off from the Catholic Church like the Protestants the Baptist Anglican church and thousand others never bothered correcting this fundamental flaw but the knowledge of reincarnation was never forgotten it was always taught in the educated and secret societies and it is now reaching a new Revival in the western world today there are more and more Christians who know about this law and are once again willing to live according to the original teachings of Christ now I hope you're inspired to explore more on this subject and maybe you want to watch related videos like the one on the law of Karma and Howa works