Did Early Christians Believe in Reincarnation?
In my previous post I talked about how Origen's view that souls existed before being born as humans related to his view that in the end, all things -- including the most wicked beings in the universe -- will convert and return to God: salvation for all! Also connected to this idea was Origen's notion that after death people would be reborn to, in a sense, "give it another go." Origen is our most famous Christian proponent of the idea of reincarnation. Reincarnations - Before Origen The idea of reincarnation had been floated for centuries before Origen. In ancient Greece, the great philosopher Pythagoras was widely believed to have been the first to perpetrate, or at least popularize the idea. Later it was allegedly held by such figures as Parmenides and Empedocles, the latter of whom had allegedly said “Before now I was a boy, and a maid, a bush and a bird, and a dumb fish leaping out of the sea.” So too we find it in the Roman tradition, as when Virgil’s Aeneas [...]
