By Dorcas Ejemeh Krubu
The word reincarnation is derived from Latin, literally meaning, entering the flesh again. Reincarnation as a belief has always been held by the great majority of mankind in the Orient. It is a concept which is known and understood as a given fact of life in almost all ancient cultures from Africa to Europe and to the Americas. It is pertinent to note that this belief was prevalent even at the time when technologically driven information exchange across continents and peoples was not in place, something which otherwise would have been argued as the product of the propagation of colonial expansionist religious belief and philosophy. Thus, it goes to show that the knowledge of reincarnation is an integral part of the human consciousness borne out of the inner recognition of Creation realities and life phenomena.
Some researchers such as Ian Stevenson and Jim Tucker have investigated the issue of reincarnation and published reports of children’s memories of previous lives in peer-reviewed journals and in books titled Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation and Life Before Life. The work of Psychiatrist Ian Stevenson is probably the best known, if not the most respected collection of scientific data that appears to provide scientific proof that the reality of reincarnation is indeed unquestionable. Instead of relying on hypnosis to verify that an individual has had a previous life, he instead chose to collect thousands of cases of children who spontaneously remembered a past life. He has over 3,000 cases of such. Many people, including skeptics and scholars, agree that these cases offer the best evidence yet for reincarnation. He also matched birthmarks and birth defects to wounds and scars on the deceased, verified by medical records such as autopsy photographs, in Reincarnation and Biology. cited by Caderet, 2005.
The human spirit is in material creation for the purpose of acquiring the degree of maturity that opens up for it the path to experiencing life consciously in the Spiritual Realm, Paradise. This development, which has a definite time frame, cannot be attained in one earthlife; hence, the necessity for reincarnation. At physical death, the soul departs the body and if reincarnation is to take place, it is the old soul that enters into and takes possession of the new body. The Laws of Attraction of Homogenous Species and Reciprocal Action principally regulate the circumstances into which we are born. The way and manner in which we lived in the past has a strong bearing on our present life. Life is an unbroken chain and all experiences are absorbed by the soul. Hence, it may not be out of place to posit that our present relationships with fellow human beings who cross our paths at different points in time may be as a consequence of interactions in the past. That is, strong ties from former earthlife may bring people together for the purpose of reconciliation, restitution or mutual advancement. It is against this backdrop that I wish to relay my personal experience on reincarnation which was unsought for but rather came to me in a natural but astounding manner.
Could it be an intuitive drive?
One afternoon, on the 19th of February, 2003, to be specific, after series of research work in the laboratory, I slumped on a chair in the office right in front of a computer and dozed off for a few minutes. During the nap, I found myself shopping with ease amidst people who looked very much like Chinese. By the time I woke up, the dream experience made a strong impression on me and I felt deep within me that it was more than just a dream. Acting on the spur-of-the-moment, I turned to the computer in front of me, went to google.com and typed in teach in China. These words came to me even without any forethought and as I clicked on search, right before me were a lot of openings. I quickly edited my Curriculum Vitae and sent it to four tertiary institutions. By the next morning, three institutions had replied and their responses were positive. One specifically asked for my telephone number which I obliged. By 7am on the 21st of February, 2003, I got a call from one of the institutions asking to know when I would be able to resume work. The other two tertiary institutions wrote to inform me that I would be accepted and that they would send my invitation letters shortly. By the beginning of the third week in which I ventured on this path, I was having three invitation letters from three different Chinese Universities; one in the north, one in the east and the other in the west of China. After scrutinizing their packages and also visiting their websites, I decided to go for the University in the north of China. As soon as I got my visa, I withdrew my services from my employer in Nigeria.
The journey on a new path
On the 6th of April 2003, I departed Nigeria for China. I arrived Beijing the capital city the next day. From there, I proceeded to Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province in the company of my employer’s representative who came to pick me. Soon as I settled in, I signed a one-year contract. During this period, I was as it were riding on invisible wings and soaring on high. My soul knew so much inner peace and joy that words could hardly explain. The first day I went to the market, I did it on my own with no directions from anyone; the market looked very familiar in every sense. While pondering over the familiarity of the market, it came to me that it was the place I saw in the short nap I had in my office on the 19th of February which preceded my path to China. My work schedule allowed me ample time to myself and as a result I made it an obligation to really go site seeing for recreational purposes. Towards the end of my contract, I had the strong desire to relocate to another part of China for the purpose of familiarizing myself with the country. This time around, my plan was to go to the southern part of the country as I did a lot of travel in the northern region within one year. To make this dream come true, I started seeking employment in the southern region. Fortunately, I got another job but my employer did not release me. With this development, I had to stay back for another one year. At the end of the second year, another barrier to my relocation reared up; I was specifically put under obligation to handle a project. All efforts to make my employer release me proved abortive. However, towards the end of the third year, a colleague recommended me to a tertiary institution in Jiangxi Province and I was offered employment.
Strong ties arising from past earthlife
In July 2006, I relocated to Jiangxi Province. During my first lecture with a new class of about thirty students, I tried to acquaint myself with them by way of getting to know their names, they all gave Chinese names, but most of which were similar. For the purpose of my class and easy interaction with them, a student suggested that I should give them English names. So starting from alphabet A-Z, I wrote some names of the board so that they would have enough to choose from. In no time, we were done with the names and I had my class. After the class, a nineteen year old girl came and introduced herself to me. She told me the English name she chose during my class was Carla and that I should address her as such. Wow…I told her it was a pleasant surprise, that my daughter’s name is Carla.
This young lady called Carla was very warm and fond of me. We became very intimate in a unique way. Almost always, she would walk me to my apartment after my lectures. Close as she was, there was some caution, as if she had something to tell me that she was not comfortable with. I sensed it and I kept looking for ways to make her talk; this made her a bit more relaxed. One day she asked me about my faith and beliefs with specific questions on my religion and whether I believed in reincarnation. I answered that “reincarnation is a fact of life, whether one believes it or not, it does not change anything”. I was very careful with my choice of words because my employment contract did not permit me to discuss religion or any topic that tends towards spirituality with students and colleagues except fellow foreigners. Hence, I explained reincarnation in the light of the traditional belief in some parts of Nigeria. To this, she heaved a sigh and said ‘yes, you have made the job easy for me’. I asked her ‘what job’? She said I should not worry but that I needed to follow her to her home town to see her mother. To me, her request was a tall order. I told her I would need some time to think about it but she would not give me any breathing space. After much pressure, I promised to go with her at the end of the first semester which coincided with the spring vacation.
On the 12th of February, 2007, we embarked on a journey by train to Carla’s home town, in the same province. Shortly before we arrived, she put a call through to her mother. Lo and behold, we arrived safely at about 3:50 pm. I was pleasantly overwhelmed at the warm welcome! Eight people came to the train station to receive us, out of who two were ladies. Even before Carla introduced her mother, I could tell who she was. Carla’s mother, Liu Wei, gave me a very warm and long hug, and at a point, it was as though I was resting my head on her shoulder, unconsciously responding to pull of the intimate bond arising from hidden connections that later came to light. Soon we were all home and had a meal together after which Liu Wei asked me to have some rest. She intimated that she was looking forward to having a chat with me later.
At about 7 pm, Liu Wei, her husband and daughter (Carla) came to me in the guest room. She said they were very happy to see me at last; that they had been expecting to see me one day in the past twenty-two years. When I heard that, immediately one question after the other started coming to mind, but I had to struggle within myself to let her finish before I could say anything.
Liu Wei’s soul moving story went like this…………When Liu Wei was about fifteen years old, she took ill and was taken to the hospital; but unfortunately, after series of laboratory tests and medications she did not get any better. She also tried the Chinese herbal medicine but still no remedy could be found. The ailment was such that she was having pains all over her body but all efforts to locate the exact source or point of the pain came to no avail. The pain was worse at night and especially during the winter period when the weather was very cold. She was taken from one hospital to the other, from one herbal home to the other without achieving good health. Due to this condition, she could not attend any formal school after the age of fifteen but was being home schooled, a situation which led to her limited education.
At a point, this interminable pain became part of her life and she could not but live with it as the solution proved intractable. At the age of twenty-two, an extended family member introduced her to a Chinese Herbal Medical Centre where she was receiving treatment from time to time. After seeing her Doctor during one of her visits, she decided to relax under a tree right in front of the herbal home. While there, she started thinking, and overwhelmed by emotions, she burst into tears. In the middle of it all, a young man sited her from a distance and walked towards her. As he approached, she wiped her tears and pulled herself together. This young man, a staff of the Chinese Herbal Home introduced himself as Wang. He observed that for about six months she had been visiting the herbal centre for the same ailment but no improvement. He suggested that there might be need for Liu Wei to look at her situation from a different viewpoint. Then she asked what exactly she should do with tears rolling down her cheeks. Wang said he would like to take her to his father, a Seer, who could find out the source of the problem and perhaps proffer a solution. Right there and then, Liu Wei and Wang agreed to visit Wang’s father in two days.
When they arrived at the old man’s house, he asked Liu Wei what brought her. She explained everything and demanded to know why she had been having incurable severe body pains since the age of fifteen. After taking a look at her eyes and palms, with his eyes closed, the Seer told her that her sickness was not that of the flesh, that it had no root in her physical body and consequently could not be cured either through orthodox nor herbal medicine. He went further to say that in her past earthlife in China, specifically in the city of Taiyuan (where I had my first employment in the north of China); she was married to a rich man with a lot of affluence. There was a family business which she was in charge of. It was a production business and the by-products were dangerous to health. Liu Wei knew this but she neither revealed it to her staff nor protected them from the effect of the by-product. Instead, she was cruel to them, in addition to the work hazard they faced. She offered accommodation along with employment and made people work round the clock without appreciating them. Worst of all, her staff were not well fed and poorly paid. It was so bad that most employees were taking ill one after the other due to the effect of the hazardous by-product, and the acute pains from the extremely hard labour. Some abandoned their work when they took ill and went their way. Liu Wei had only one daughter then who was seen by her employees as a saving grace. She was the only one who cared about the ill treated workers. She would see to their feeding, attend to their needs and even sometimes go an extra mile to see how she could make her mother understand the feelings of the people. And she kept appealing to the workers to forgive her mother because of her. The few subjects who continued with their work did because of the little girl who was a mediator between the boss and her subjects.
On a particular occasion, a lady died on duty and her last words were ………. Since she started working with Liu Wei, she had known nothing but pains and distress, were it not for her daughter, she would have been dead and now that the hour has come, she must go. But that Liu Wei must pay back all what she had done. She would experience the pains and sorrows she had caused them and so shall it be until she has changed and be forgiven………..then the woman gave up.
After a couple of months, another lady was in the phase of passing on and called her mistress’ daughter; she said:
……. “I can see that your mother would not change, I stand on the words of the last person who passed on at work and I am adding that when the repercussions come back to your mother, I pray that you will also be there to help her alleviate her pains, just the way you endeavoured to alleviate our pains.”
And the daughter faithfully promised “I will be there for my mother, anytime any day……then the worker passed on.
For Liu Wei, this revelation was a bolt from the blue! She had no choice but to ask the Seer for the way forward. To this, the old man said that her daughter of that time is alive on earth again at this time, but still a little girl from Edo part of Nigeria. That sometime in the future when she is of age, she would come to China for her sake and for other things. Liu Wei asked how she would get to know when the Nigerian lady comes. The Seer said that the Nigerian lady would be her daughter’s teacher. She thought this to be improbable, burst into tears and asked the Seer “how?” As at then, having a suitor, let alone a child was an impossible dream for Liu Wei, not with her grave physical conditions. She further asked if there was anything she could do at least to keep alive before the Nigerian lady comes. The man said to her that she should go her way and be good to people and wait patiently for the lady.
After two years, Liu Wei got married to Wang, the son of the Seer. His full name is Wang Wei. Three years into their marriage, Liu and Wang Wei had a baby girl called Li Wei (Carla). All through Carla’s primary and secondary education, she had no foreign teacher. But in her second year in university and for the first time in the history of the institution, foreign lecturers were employed and I was one of them, a native of Edo State, Nigeria. Coincidentally, I was scheduled to teach Li Wei’s class and also, it so happened that of all English names I wrote on the board, the only name that appealed to her, Carla, is my daughter’s name. That was one coincidence too many.
After all the talk from Liu Wei that lasted for more than an hour, I was gobsmacked! The story so humbled my soul and as a result I was completely at a loss for what to say. Afterwards, I managed to ask her a few questions, the answers to which she obliged. However, the air was filled with a thousand unspoken words. Soon, a silence so thick that one could slice it with a knife followed. This made it difficult for communication to flow freely. Instead of talking as a sign of courtesy, I rounded up by first expressing my gratitude and also letting her know that I heard and understood all what she said and that we would talk more the next day.
The closing of the cycle
Shortly after they left my room, I dwelt on the astonishing revelation and along the line fell asleep. In the middle of the night, I had a very striking dream. I saw the picture of a lady who came to me and the impressions I got from our communication was that I have fulfilled the promise I once made to relieve Liu Wei of her pains arising from mistreating people and that we can now go our separate ways for a cycle that once opened about three hundred years ago is now closed………… I broke into sweat as I woke up, only to see that it was about 3:12 am. For the rest of the night, I could not fall asleep because I was deeply shaken by the reality that I was facing. What occupied my mind was how such an unpretentious and perhaps careless statement made in the past could be so strong that I had to journey from one continent to another to fulfill it.
As early as 6 am, Liu Wei knocked on my door, I let her in and she apologized for disturbing my sleep. She told me that she had been up since about 2:48 am after a dream she considered outlandish. In the dream, she saw the following words inscribed on the wall but in Chinese characters: “ Today, all your pains are gone and gone forever so long as you love all”. Afterwards, she woke up startled and actually saw the words on the wall but faded out in seconds! The biggest piece of news she relayed to me was that she woke up light and very strong. And that the only time she felt the way she was feeling was when she was before the age of fifteen. All her pains were gone! At this point, I had no choice but to tell her my dream.
I was with the Wang Wei’s family for three nights, we dined and wined together, went for shopping and recreation together. The most rewarding part of our meeting besides the primary reason was the opportunity we had to share life experiences, the truths about life and my convictions on the meaning of life and the purpose of existence.
Then came the day I was to go back to my base, it was as if we should all return together. Nonetheless, Carla and I returned. By the passing of each day, the bond between us became ever stronger. At a point in time, she moved out of her hostel and lived with me until I left Jiangxi Province in July, 2008.
Conclusion
Although sharing this experience may lend yet another voice to the Creation reality of re-incarnation as a fact of life, yet it is more out of a desire to give outward expression to an inner perception of how even the slightest, and what we consider inconsequential actions whether in thoughts, words or visible actions can so strongly and inevitably impact on our lives and determine the course of our existence, not only in this life but in the beyond and far into the future. Life is an unbroken line, a continuum. Thus we cannot be too careful and watchful in our dealings with our fellow human beings and indeed our relationship with the entire Creation. But far and above this, we are invested with the natural ability to bring about only peace and happiness, and spreading the high blessings which the spiritual can readily mediate. We stand in times in which the Will of the Creator demands that we to live up to our full potentials. The kingdom of heaven must come within us, leading to a new world order of peace and helping love to the advancement of all creatures, to the Honour and Glory of the Almighty Creator of all.
References
Cadoret, R. (2005) Book Review: European Cases of the Reincarnation Type. The American Journal of
Psychiatry, April 2005 Edition.
Stevenson, I. (1980). Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation, University of Virginia Press.
ISBN 978-0-8139-0872-4
Tucker, J. (2005). Life before life: a scientific investigation of children’s memories of previous lives. St. Martin’s
Press, New York. ISBN 0-312-32137-6.
