Or: We Do Not Believe in Reincarnation or Past Lives. Maybe.
Scientology is filled with strange, conflicting and confusing beliefs. Claiming a belief in a Supreme Being while at the same time calling their Thetan “Creator of life, itself” then hedging by saying you can believe in God if you want to.
Or not.
It has been said many times before, Scientology is consistent only in its inconsistency.
First COS is “multi Denominational” yet under oath to the IRS asserted that Scientology tech must be practiced exclusively.
Of course they stand for an end of bigotry and hate, offering support and comfort to the Jewish community. At the same time COS partners with one of the most outspoken, hate filled, anti Semitic people in society today; Louis Farrakhan and his NOI.
The contradictions go on and on but there is one so-called belief that stands out above the others for its confusion; the insistence that the Thetan is immortal, returning over and over.
Reincarnation as commonly understood is the idea that the soul is reborn into a new body to continue it’s journey and complete any unfinished business. Once it has overcome whatever caused it to return, it is free.
Scientology however does not ascribe to the traditional ideas of reincarnation. It doesn’t believe that the soul, or Thetan, is reborn. Rather the Thetan is the person and it is already grown. Even children are seen as adults in small bodies and treated accordingly. Once the Thetan leaves one body it simply inhabits another and continues on. It carries with it the memories and experiences of all its past lives, which auditing helps it remember.
Think of it as a person on the street (the Thetan) who jumps in a taxi. He rides this cab for awhile, then gets out and hails another one. The Thetan is the same, it’s the taxi that keeps changing.
As usual, however, Scientology simply cannot keep their ideology straight. They hedge their bets by claiming Thetans have lived before and will do so again on the one hand, while stating they don’t believe in past lives as a dogma on the other.
“Today in Scientology, many people have certainty that they have lived lives prior to their current one. These are referred to as past lives, not as reincarnation. Past lives is not a dogma in Scientology, but generally Scientologists, during their auditing, experience a past life and then know for themselves that they have lived before.”
—https://www.scientology.org/faq/scientology-beliefs/reincarnation.html
You can believe if you want to.
Or not.
This is interesting in that “dogma” means teaching or belief. Scientology teaches that the Thetan is immortal.
During The Aftermath viewers have heard from former members that they were expected to call on knowledge from a former life to do current jobs. Tyler Adams lost his eye while working with unfamiliar tools in the SeaOrg. He had been told that he’d used the tools in a past life and should just remember how in this one.
In another episode viewers heard the claim that someone was told that while their donation was not going to be refunded, they could use it in a next life to continue their studies.
In spite of their claims to the contrary Scientology definitely teaches that there are past and future lives.
Their belief that LRH is off doing research somewhere and will return proves the point.
Once again, in trying desperately to ascribe to some sort of spiritual doctrine, they simply can’t commit.
Why teach that the Thetan is immortal then deny there is a dogma of past lives?
Scientology may attempt to argue that the Thetan is one, continuous existence. Accumulating experiences while on only one, unending track. The counter to that is to ask why such a Being needs a body? If it is not reborn, why would an adult Thetan show up in a child’s body?
Why is everything connected to Scientology so chaotic and contradictory?
Because Scientology was never meant to be a religion in the first place.
In Dianetics, Hubbard stated it was a “Science of the Mind” and “Not a Religion”.
He later repeated this in his Hubbard Communications Office Policy Letter (HCOPL) 29 Oct. 1962,
‘“Religion”
Scientology 1970 is being planned on a religious organization basis
throughout the world. This will not upset in any way the usual
activities of any organization. It is entirely a matter for accountants
and solicitors.”
Also here:
“Scientology has opened the gates to a better World. It is not a psycho-therapy nor a religion. It is a body of knowledge which, when properly used, gives freedom and truth to the individual.”
—The Creation Of Human Ability (1954), p. 251
Trying to force a round peg into a square hole just damages the peg. Desperately trying to turn Dianetics into a spiritual organization meant that Hubbard grabbed at anything he could find to provide the gloss of religiosity. He hoped that with enough words to confuse he could hide the fact that the spirituality he was “borrowing” did not fit within the original framework he’d created.
It can’t and does not work. Something has to give and for Scientology that something is the ability to stand up to scrutiny.
For every claim made by Scientology there seems to exist an equal and opposite claim. This is the Law of Scientology.
The CCHR asserts Mental Illness is not real, rather it is a construct of Big Pharma to generate money. Hubbard himself recognized Mental Illness as a real condition and claimed his tech was the only thing that could cure it.
Scientology promises that the dedicated member can attain the state of Clear and recover telekinetic mind powers.
Not one Clear has ever managed to produce any tangible proof of that state.
This cult wants the world to believe that although they believe in an immortal, omniscient Thetan they do not embrace reincarnation or the idea of past lives.
“So what is commonly thought of as reincarnation is a definite system and is not part of Scientology.”
—https://www.scientology.org/faq/scientology-beliefs/reincarnation.html
“Scientology has opened the gates to a better World… when properly used, gives freedom and truth to the individual.”
If the tech gives freedom and truth then this planet should already be halfway to Clear. The Thetans are the “Creators of Life, Itself” yet they are unable to properly use the tech?
They are immortal with godlike capabilities yet are not smart enough to go Clear without the words of a delusional, dishonest, con man to guide them?
Thetans have lived millions of years and learned nothing on their own? These powerful beings are dependent upon the bodies they inhabit to live and learn. After all, if they could exist as true spirits and exercise their super powers without bodies why wouldn’t they?
Yet in spite of all the power attributed to them, there they are, jumping from body to body over the millennia, living lifetime after lifetime, unable to help themselves let alone Clear the Planet of crime, war or insanity.
Reincarnation is being reborn and living a new life in order to grow and seek spiritual enlightenment through living ethically. Once the soul has achieved the proper enlightenment it can be free.
Scientology claims the Thetan exists always, body jumping through time seeking to reclaim its godlike status. But it is not reborn and there may or may not have been past lives. There is no Heavenly reward, Nirvana or Elysian Fields to work towards.
Not even a resting in peace or final ending.
Just a continuation with no end in sight.
Not reincarnation, no past lives.
Thetans existing ad infinitum in lifetime after lifetime.
Is it or isn’t it?
This is just one more example of the great contradiction that is Scientology.
Confront And Shatter 