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The False Doctrine of Reincarnation
RV88-01© Berean Memorial Church of Irving, Texas, Inc. (1993)
We are studying worship in the throne room in Revelation 4:6-11. It is quite obvious to any believer who knows anything about the Bible that the
devil hates God, and has devoted himself to propagating all the lies about God that he can. The greatest lie of Satan is on how a sinful human
being can escape the hell that he rightly deserves. Satan's deception is built on his two false doctrines of karma and reincarnation, which are
taught by Eastern mysticism. When you talk to the devil about how to go to heaven, this is his answer – the twin doctrines (the twin
supports) of karma and reincarnation.
Karma
The doctrine of karma, as we have learned, states that a person, apart from any divine provision, determines his eternal status on the basis of
how he lives and how he pays for his own wrongdoing. Evil conduct produces bad karma (or bad effects) in one's life. Good conduct produces good
karma (or good effects) in one's life. Bad karma is suffering for evil conduct, while good karma is blessing for good conduct. All bad karma (or
experiences) thus is one's own fault.
The doctrine of karma is presented as the reason for the presence of evil and suffering in the world. In the realm of Eastern mysticism, this
is the doctrine which is used to explain why one person is born with physical defects, and another is born completely healthy; why one baby is
born blind, and another baby is born with perfect sight; why one person is born rich, and another is born poor; why one is born to a status of
injustice and indignity, and another to a status of justice and honor; why one person is born with a good personality, and another with a bad;
why one person is born gifted, and another is born totally untalented; why one person is born free, and another person is born a slave; and,
why one person is born in the United States, and another person has the bad karma to be born in Russia. The doctrine of karma is what is used
to explain these consequences within the human race, and each of the consequences is viewed as something that the person deserves. Karma, of
course, very unscientifically, ignores the real genetic causes for many of these defects and undesirable factors that human beings experience.
The problem for the karma doctrine, of course, is: who is the supreme authority that decides what is good or what is bad conduct to determine
what is good or bad karma? Some people say that man himself is the one who decides whether a conduct is good or bad. Other people don't like
to say that, so they say that God decides, but at the same time, they mean that man himself is deity, so they are saying the same thing –
that man is the one who determines what is good and what is bad.
That's the way it works for the doctrine of karma. The man himself determines what is good and what is bad. There is no standard of absolute
righteousness as with the God of the Bible. Karma is always seen as something that one is able to remove. He is able to remove his moral guilt
by some payment he can make. The payment is never infinite, as the Bible indicates – that man could not pay for his sin. Satan says that,
by the doctrine of karma, you can pay it.
Under karma, a person doesn't really know what he is being punished for from a previous life, so he really can't have any guidance for changing
his conduct. A person, therefore, is likely to repeat this act of evil in each life, and not know how to improve his karma. A person has no way
to measure even his spiritual progress compared to his past to see if his past evil is less than his present.
Reincarnation
So, this brings us to the second main pillar of Eastern mysticism, and that is the doctrine of reincarnation. Since no one can pay for the bad
karma of another, everyone has to do his own suffering. But while no one can escape pain for his own bad karma, one lifetime is not long enough
to pay the price. So, the devil comes up with another doctrine. First he has karma, where you're going to pay for what you did. Then the devil
says that you're going to be reborn through a cycle of many lives. He provides repeated reincarnations to give the sinner time to pay for his
evil, and to achieve the status ultimately of bliss.
To the unsaved man, who is a rebel against God, this is an enormously relieving concept, because immediately you don't have to worry about ever
facing a lake of fire. Ultimately, you're going to make it. If it takes 10,000 reincarnations, you're going to make it. If you are aware of this,
and you try to act better in each life than you did in the previous one, you're going to be constantly reborn into a better status than you were
before.
So, now we will look at this other extremely false doctrine, but one which, by and large, Americans are not adverse to – the doctrine of
reincarnation. It is the law of rebirths. It is the belief that a human soul experiences a series of rebirths during which the soul is gradually
purged of evil by sufferings which are administered by the law of karma. The reincarnations of the soul can be into either an animal body or a
human body. For this reason, the sincere Hindu will be very careful. The very devout Hindu will be very careful when he even walks down a path
to look what he is stepping on, lest he step on a bug and crush the life out of it, and that bug is someone who's trying to suffer that state to
work out some bad karma so that he can be born into a better status (to be born into a human level).
The doctrine of reincarnation is thus the companion to the doctrine of karma as the basis of salvation in Eastern mysticism. If one fails to
compensate for sin in this life, he will have a chance to do it in another life. The goal of reincarnation is for the soul ultimately to reach
a state of complete cleansing from evil, and thus to be released from the wheel of rebirths. That is the whole goal of reincarnation. The
Hindus talk about that as coming to moksha. Moksha, in Hinduism, is that ideal state when you don't have to be reborn anymore – where
you have now achieved bliss. You come to a status where you are liberated from the bondage of finite existence. You're beyond any good or evil.
You're beyond any pleasure or pain. You're in a status called Nirvana, which you have reached by human rituals and by your good work efforts.
At this point, the person loses his individuality. He retains his consciousness, but he becomes absorbed in the essence of the universe –
ultimate reality.
There are millions of people who believe this, and millions of people who die and go out into eternity depending upon this as their hope. It is
a false hope. It is a self-destructive hope. However, as I've indicated, religious surveys show that upwards of 60% of Americans believe that
reincarnation is possible. So, the present life is not viewed by these Americans as the final time that determines one's destiny. This life now
becomes just a staging area for the next one, and dealing with God before you die does not become so urgent. It's a brilliant plan on the part
of the devil. It's a brilliant set of doctrines that wipes out, for those who believe these two doctrines, all possible basis of achieving
eternal life. The biblical ground of salvation is completely destroyed.
Intuitive Recall
You may say to a person, "Why do you believe the doctrine of reincarnation? Isn't that kind of foolish?" They'll generally come up with certain
lines of argument to prove it. One is what we could call intuitive recall. The French expression is déjà vu, and all of us have had the
impression sometime or another that we meet somebody and we say, "Haven't I met you before somewhere?" There are certain boys who use that as a
line (as an approach) to make an entree into a girl's interest and affection and companionship, but there is really that feeling of meeting
somebody, and you say, "Where have I met this person before? I feel like I know this person." Or you have the impression that you've been
someplace. You walk someplace, and you say, "I feel like I've been here before."
Actually, this is generally due to similarities that are recorded in our subconscious of past associations that we have had in this life –
not in a past life. It is something that we at one time heard, or something that we at one time saw.
On one of our trip camps, we were out west; we were on the trail; we were making a hike to one of the falls; and, we were deep into the forest.
When we turned the corner and approached this falls, it was a very secluded, isolated place. There was the falls, and there was a pool of water,
and some of us got into the water. It was terribly cold, but it was a very beautiful spot as the water came tumbling down. David Drews was on
that trip camp, and he had just recently returned from Israel. On the tour that he took, one of the places that he was able to visit was Engedi,
where David and his men retired to as a place of hiding from the soldiers of Saul and from the agents of Saul who were out looking for them. I
remember as we came around the trail, and suddenly burst on our view of this falls and this secluded, quiet place and the pool below, David said,
"This looks like Engedi." Later, I looked up some pictures, and it did. I could see what he was saying.
Well, he could have just as well have looked heavenward; rolled his eyes; put his hands together; and, said in a hushed tone in the depths of that
forest, "I have been here before. I've been here before in another life when I was a (whatever)." And that's the idea here – that you
suddenly feel that you have been here before, but that is actually a past association from this life. And it has been consciously forgotten, but
subconsciously preserved.
Spontaneous Recall
Another argument is spontaneous recall. I notice that entertainers love to recall their past lives. They'll say, "Well, I just spontaneously
(just suddenly) became aware that I once was someone else." Well, most of the time, that's a product of wishful thinking and daydreaming.
It's a self-con job. Of course, children, with their vivid imaginations, are very good at imagining that they were someone else – that they
have been in somebody else's body and form in the past.
I remember when my number two son was a little boy. As soon as he would come home from kindergarten or first grade, he would put on his Batman
costume, and he would walk around every day with that stupid Batman costume. I remember my number three son, at the same stage, had secured a
Superman costume. He'd come home from school; go to his room; take his clothes off; put his Superman costume on; and, he would walk around the
rest of the day out there with his cape flying, and carrying on his activities with that Superman costume with the big "S" written on his chest.
To this day, that number three son thinks he is Superman on occasion, and that number two son thinks he is Batman, and in many respects, we must agree
with him that he probably is, the way that he acts sometimes. Children have an imagination. They can put themselves in these various roles that they play.
It is easy for a person to excite his imagination, and want to picture himself as somebody great. So, he says, "This is a reincarnation."
You have to be careful about that. If you go around saying, "I'm Napoleon," you may find yourself in a very unpleasant place. Just say, "I used
to be Napoleon in the past," but even that will probably get you in trouble. But that is that idea of spontaneous recall.
Hypnosis Recall
Another argument that people give is one that is probably the most significant one – the one that's most often referred to, and one that
probably bears the most merit, and that is hypnosis recall. That is where people are put under hypnotic spells, and then they are told to regress,
and they go beyond their own lifespan into a lifespan beyond.
A few years ago, there was wide publicity about the reincarnation of a lady named Bridey Murphy. Here was this lady who was recalling her past
in Ireland when she was this particular lady. She could speak Gaelic under hypnosis, and she didn't know that under a normal state. In time,
with subsequent examinations, it was discovered that when she was a very little girl, she had been living in Ireland, and she was told stories
by one of her grandmothers or aunts speaking in Gaelic. And she had completely forgotten that. She was so small that she had no recollection of
that, but it was imprinted on the subconscious. Under hypnosis, what was imprinted there was brought forth as if it was from another previous
life. And the stories that she was told about Bridey Murphy, she associated with herself.
However, of course, hypnosis is also one of the primary ways that opens a person to demonic manipulation. That's why hypnosis is very dangerous.
That's why self-hypnosis is very dangerous. This is an area that is tailor-made for demonic influence and for demonic activity. And the promotion
of the concept of reincarnation as the basis of people recalling past lives under hypnosis, in all likelihood, is demonic recollection. It is no
proof of reincarnation.
Psychic Recall
Then there is psychic recall as another argument. This is what the medium does in a séance. People are in a séance, and a person begins to speak.
The person that is speaking through this individual claims to be someone that has lived in the past, and is a reincarnation of the individual that
is speaking. This kind of psychic recall, again, is demonic deception – pretending to speak from a past life. Certainly, it is no proof of
reincarnation.
Religious Questions
There is one thing that is particularly interesting in the supposed recalls of one kind of another, particularly under hypnosis and psychic
recall. When religious questions are asked, the answers (as we noted when we studied Edgar Cayce) are always the doctrines
of Eastern mysticism. It is never the doctrines of Christianity. If Christian doctrines are referred to, they're referred to in a distorted way
so that they become false. That is significant. The powers of the people that are being communicated with, and the powers that are communicating
through those individuals, are the powers of Satan, and so they promote Satan's religion. And, of course, Satan, the master liar, always tells
lies. Even when he presents what is true, he presents it in a way to distort it into a lie. He lies about true doctrine.
There are other arguments that you will face that are perhaps more forceful, of people that you may be dealing with, trying to steer them away
from the self-destruction that the concept of reincarnation gives. And that is the turning of people, as Satan did with Jesus in the temptation
wilderness, to use the Bible to prove that the Bible teaches reincarnation. Edgar Cayce was very clear about this. He was a Sunday school
teacher. His position was that he should know something about the Bible. He was able to move into a hypnotic spell, and through spirit
contact, bring information, and even a diagnosis and a prescription that brought many healings to people. So, he certainly would have an
understanding of what the Bible taught about reincarnation.
So, there are Scriptures that these people use. One of them is Matthew 17:10-13: "And His disciples asked Him, saying, 'Why then do the scribes
say that Elijah must come first?' And Jesus answered and said unto them, 'Elijah truly shall first come and restore all things. But I say unto you
that Elijah is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatever they desired. Likewise, the Son of Man shall also suffer of
them.' Then the disciples understood that He spoken to them of John the Baptist." That sounds like pretty powerful ammunition. It sounds like
Jesus is saying to the people that he's talking to that they have been taught that Elijah must come in some expression before the arrival of the
Messiah Savior. Jesus says, "That expression has come. Elijah has come. You didn't recognize him. You rejected him." The disciples put two and two
together, and they understood that Jesus was referring to John the Baptist.
John the Baptizer here, then, is declared to be a reincarnation of Elijah. But again, if we look into Scripture, and we match Scripture with
Scripture, we know what happened to Elijah. 2 Kings 2:11 records for us the historical occasion when Elijah was caught up alive in his physical
body and taken to heaven. He was taken to heaven alive without dying. Luke 9:30-33 describe to us the incident on the Mount of Transfiguration
when Peter, James, and John saw Jesus Christ speaking to Elijah. And Elijah was standing there in his same physical body. John the Baptizer,
obviously then, could not have been a reincarnation of Elijah. Elijah was still alive in his physical body. The Bible indeed states that very
clearly – that the meaning of Jesus in his remark concerning Elijah and John the Baptist was that they were different.
John the Baptist himself said that outright. John 1:21: "And they asked him, 'What then? Are you Elijah?' He (John the Baptist) said, 'I am not.'"
Then they asked him another thing: "Are you that prophet?" And that is referring to the prophet who was promised who would be in the pattern
of Moses, which was Jesus: "And he answered, 'No.'" So, John himself very clearly said, "No, I am not Elijah." What the Lord meant is clarified
for us in Luke 1:17, which says, concerning John the Baptist, "And he shall go before Him (that is, Jesus Christ) in the Spirit and power of
Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the
Lord." John the Baptizer came in the spirit and power of Elijah, and that's what the Scriptures refer to – that John would come in that
kind of presentation. It was not that he was a reincarnation of Elijah.
Another verse that may be thrown up to you is John 3:3. This one seems to be a more powerful one for reincarnation. John 3:3 says. "Jesus
answered (to Nicodemus) and said unto him, 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."
The reincarnation folks say, "You see, it's very clear. Jesus Himself said that you have to be reincarnated if you expect to see the Kingdom
of God. You have to be reincarnated again and again and again to work out your bad karma until you can enter the Kingdom of God."
However, of course, the new birth that Jesus speaks of here is spiritual new birth – not physical new birth. This is shown by John 3:6:
"That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. The new birth is a spiritual experience which must
take place before physical death – not after. When Jesus said, "You must be born again," He meant that you have to be born again before
you die physically, or you are doomed.
In John 3:16, we're told that that new birth is spiritually from faith in Jesus Christ as Savior. Notice, with that, John 1:12-13: "But as many
as received Him, to them He gave power to become the children of God, even to them that believe on His name; who are born not of blood, nor of
the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." That is reiterating the same concept of a spiritual new birth. So, what Jesus is
telling Nicodemus is not that he has to be reincarnated, but that he must have a spiritual new birth.
Another related verse is Hebrews 7:2-3. The argument is made that Jesus Christ is declared to be a reincarnation of Melchizedek. It says, "To
whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all, first being by interpretation, king of righteousness, and after that, also King of Salem, which is
the king of peace. Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like unto the Son
of God, abides the priest continually." Then notice Hebrews 5:6: "As he said also in another place, 'You are a priest forever after the order of
Melchizedek.'"
As you know, Melchizedek was an historical character. His ancestry is described in Hebrew 7:3 in such a way as to convey the image that he is
eternal – to convey the image that he had no beginning and no ending. That is because Melchizedek is being compared to Jesus Christ. The
point of Hebrews 7:4-10 is that Melchizedek was a priest after an order which was superior to that of the Aaronic priesthood. The Melchizedek
priesthood was superior to the Aaronic priesthood. That's the important thing that's being said.
The reason this is important is because there's a question later down the line as to which priesthood is superior: the priesthood of Moses; or,
the priesthood of Melchizedek, in which Jesus Christ came. If the priesthood of Melchizedek, of which Christ was a part of, is the superior
priesthood, then what He says is superior to what the Law of Moses said. That is the whole argument here in the book of Hebrews. Jesus was a
priest in the superior priesthood of Melchizedek, but Melchizedek and Jesus are not one and the same person. That is not what is suggested at
all.
So, the Bible is again distorted. When you put it together in its proper context, and you bring this particular passage, it is giving the
illumination concerning why you and I are guilty of what Adam did in the Garden of Eden. If you're born into this life, and you never commit
a single sin, you're going to go to hell if you are without Christ. That is because you already have the moral guilt of Adam upon you. Adam,
in God's sight, was our federal head who represented all of us. We were all in him. As in this passage, the line of argument is that Aaron was
in Abraham; Abraham paid tithes to Melchizedek; and, he recognized Melchizedek as his superior. Therefore, all who are descended from Abraham are
in a position of inferiority to the Melchizedek priesthood. It's a very important passage. Certainly, there is no implication that Jesus and
Melchizedek are the same individuals.
We Die only Once
In Hebrews 9:27, we have the business of reincarnation, perhaps, put in very distinct; very clear; and, complete perspective: "It is appointed unto
men once to die, but after this, the judgment." I don't know how you could be clearer than that. It is appointed unto a human being to die one
time – not to die 100 times in 100 different bodies. It is appointed unto a human being once to die, and following that death, to face the
judgment of God.
There is, of course, the question: if reincarnation is true, what does this do to resurrection? 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 make it very clear
that we are resurrected in our physical bodies – the same body that went into the grave: "For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven
with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, with the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain
shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. So, we shall ever be with the Lord." Verse 16 says that the
Christians who are dead in the graves will be raised. When it says "they will be raised," that means their physical bodies. Verse 17 said that
the Christians who are alive, at the point of the rapture, will go up in those physical bodies, transformed and glorified, but in those same
bodies.
Jesus Christ is our Example
So, the Bible is clear that, in eternity, a person will be in his physical body. If a person has been through 100 bodies, which one will be
raised to life? Which one is the body that he's going to be in? Of course, the question is unanswerable. The resurrection of Jesus Christ does
answer that question for us, because the Bible is also clear that what is going to happen to you and me is identically demonstrated to us by
Jesus Christ. What happened to Him is what will happen to us. Potentially, you may experience physical death. Jesus experienced physical death.
But the thing that happened to Him was that the death was reversed, and He came back to life. The Bible says that you will follow in His pattern,
and death will be reversed for you eventually (if you do experience death before the rapture), and you will have your physical body. Jesus had
His physical body, and it was the identical, same physical body that had been put into the tomb, and that they all knew.
This was made very clear.
John 20:26-28 records in the upper room when Jesus appeared to the disciples. Thomas was not there when Jesus first appeared. Thomas said, "I
don't believe that He's been raised from the dead." In fact, Thomas says, "I'm not going to believe it unless I've got something that I can put
my hands on to prove that I'm not just looking at a ghost, and that it's the real thing." Thomas said, "I'm going to be even more specific than
that. I want to see the hole in His side from that spear, and I want to see the holes in His hands and His feet before I believe it." What
Thomas was saying was, "If Jesus Christ has actually been raised from the dead, then He should be raised in the same body that we saw mutilated
and bruised on that cross."
John 20:26: "After eight days, again, His disciples were inside, and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, with the doors being shut, and stood in
the midst, and said, 'Peace be unto you." Then He said to Thomas, 'Reach here your finger, and behold My hands, and reach here your hand, and
thrust it into My side, and be not faithless, but believing.' And Thomas answered and said to Him, 'My Lord and my God.'" What this Scripture
teaches us is that the Lord Jesus Christ, who indeed had experienced physical death, was raised back to life. He was raised in the same body
that He had previously – the body that He had died in. Our pattern of resurrection will be the same. The body that you die in, whenever
that is (if that should be) is the body that you will be raised in. The Bible is indicating that there is no such thing as a person being
reincarnated in several bodies.
That tremendously splendid man of the Old Testament, Job, has been such an inspiration over the centuries to all of us as believers. Job knew
this same fact, and he knew it well. You could never have tricked Job with the idea of reincarnation. In Job 19:25, he makes that tremendous
statement that Handel used in The Messiah: "For I know that my redeemer lives, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth.
And though worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and I shall behold, and not another,
though my heart be consumed within me." Job knew this very clearly. No matter what happened to his body in terms of physical decay or of deterioration,
he would stand in that body before the living God.
"I Am"
Another verse that we ought to consider is John 8:58. Someone might bring this one up to you and say, "You see, this one proves reincarnation:"
Jesus says, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am." The Jews that he is debating are holding up their father Abraham as a
superior authority to Jesus Christ. Jesus says, "Listen, let's put Abraham and Me in perspective, and I'll tell you how to do it. Before Abraham
was, I am." When He used that expression, I think most of you probably are now aware that the word "I am" is a word related to the Hebrew word
"YHWH." The word "I am" is declaring that Jesus existed on the earth before Abraham. So the reincarnation folks say, "Yes, that's it, Jesus is
saying that He has been reincarnated because He lived before Abraham, and He lives after Abraham." But what Jesus is doing is quoting Exodus 3:14,
where Moses is fearful of going to the Jews with this tremendous message that God is about ready to free them from 400 years of slavery in Egypt.
For Moses to come with such a dramatic declaration and for him to be taken seriously (for the people to believe him), Moses says, Whom shall I
say has sent me?" And God gives him the answer that he knew the people would immediately understand. God told Moses, "Tell them that 'I am' has
sent you."
This is God's way of declaring His eternity. He has no beginning, and no end. He is eternal, and only the living person God can use the term
"I am." So, when Moses approached the people, and they wanted to know who had sent him, when he told them that "I am" had sent him, they knew
what he was saying, and they were ready to listen to him. "I am" is a derivative of God's name, "YHWH," and that, as you know, is those four
Hebrew letters which are called the sacred Tetragrammaton. It was so sacred that a Jew would never pronounce it. I notice in publications that
I read from time to time, published by Jews today, every time they come to that sacred Tetragrammaton, if they're quoting Scripture, they still
put in the word "Adonai," the word for Lord. They won't say that sacred name of God.
When Jesus applies this title to Himself, what is He doing? He is here telling these Jews, "Whatever you can say about Abraham, he's just a man.
What I am saying to you, while I have a human body, I am saying to you as the living, personal, Creator, Sovereign God. 'I am' is who I am. I am
the eternal God." That's what He was claiming. The Jews who heard him (I guarantee you) knew exactly what He was saying, because if you will
notice John 8:59 (the next verse), they immediately proceeded to act as they had been commanded by Moses to act whenever they found somebody
guilty of blasphemy. Of course, for a human being to claim to be God is blasphemy in the extreme.
Verse 59 says, "Then they took up stones to cast at Him. But Jesus hid Himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them,
and so passed by." They were immediately going to stone Him to death. Had He been an ordinary human being, they would have had a legal right
to do that because the man would have been guilty of blasphemy. But Jesus Christ made no hesitancy to declare that He was God. This passage,
in John 8:58, does not teach that Jesus had been reincarnated from the time that He existed before Abraham, but that He had always existed.
He always lived. He was God.
In John 10:30, you have again this emphasis by the Lord Jesus that He is God: Jesus says, "I and My Father are one." Again, the Jews knew what
He was saying: "Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, 'I have shown you many good works from My Father. Of which
of those works do you stone Me?" The Jews answered Him, saying, "We don't stone you for a good work, but for blasphemy, because You, being a man,
make Yourself God." They understood very clearly what the Lord was saying.
So, this is the twofold doctrines of demons that Satan puts together and says, "This is how you will escape the judgment of hell. You have a
karma to pay for. You have an evil that must be paid for. That makes sense to people. People say, "That's right. That's fair. That's just.
And I am guilty, and I should pay for it." Satan says, "That's right. And I want to tell you, you can pay for it, but you need more time than
one lifetime." Therefore, the impersonal force of the universe (the essence of the universe) has built in it the reincarnating of your soul
in the physical body again and again, and going on up with your karma (when your karma is good), going on closer and closer to where you come
to the nothingness of Nirvana, until you reach a moksha, and you are free of the wheel of reincarnation. To most Americans, that makes sense,
because they are ignorant of the Word of God.
A Mantra
Let's throw in one more doctrine of demons. This one is important in approaching deity. Now that you have achieved the basis of salvation, in
Eastern mysticism, you must have a basis of approaching deity. A mantra is a sound which is used to set up vibrations to contact spirits powers,
and there are a set of basic sound vibrations. This is what gurus do with their devotees (their followers). You cannot learn a mantra on your
own. Your guru has to teach that to you, and your guru decides what particular sound is suitable to you.
These mantras are sounds from the old Hindu language of Sanskrit. Sanskrit was never written. It was always just spoken. It was a language which
was used as the sounds for the code names of Hindu deities. Every sound vibration embodies a certain spirit being. So, it's not just some little
cute thing that your guru says, "Now I want you to repeat after me. This will be your mantra. When you had your periods of meditation, this is
how you will approach God. This is how you will work out your bad karma – by repeating this mantra over and over again. And this is the
way you will come into contact with the world beyond." The thing which is achieved by psychedelic drugs is achieved through the repetition of
the mantras that detach your conscious mind, and enable your subconscious to take over, so that you suddenly find yourself on a planet, and
you're looking out at a world of deities, and you communicate with them, and you talk to them, and you learn from them.
So, your guru says, "This is your sound," and he gives you that sound. And you practice it until you get it right. So, you get up in the morning;
you get up before the picture of your particular guru; you lay out the flowers; you lay out the candles; you lay out all the incense; you lay out
all of the paraphernalia; and, then you take the lotus position (with your feet crossed in front of you). You get yourself in that crossed-leg
lotus position, and then you proceed with your meditation. You repeat the sound that your guru gave you. And pretty soon you psych yourself right
out of your rationality, and you are disconnected from anything around you. Your meditation has taken you into communication with the gods
who are, in fact, demon spirits.
A mantra is a very subtle and dangerous thing. And a lot of Christians believe that it is an innocent thing, and
they practice it in a variety of ways themselves. This mantra is repeated endlessly until it becomes part of your subconscious mind. But don't
forget that the vibrations of your particular mantra are vibrations that are connected with a certain demon spirit – a certain Hindu deity
that you are calling upon who comes to you to enable you to be taught and to give you assistance.
It's like a seed which is planted in the subconscious, and it bears its bitter occult fruit through the influence of the Hindu god that it
represents. The repetition of the mantra is, in effect, the calling upon the demon spirit to possess the meditator. It is the means of entering
into communication with him.
So, through the mantra, human power is supplemented by demon spirit powers who pretend to be God. Suddenly, you find yourself with tremendous
power. You find yourself accomplishing successes that you didn't believe possible, because when you are in meditation, you are meditating for
a purpose. You're using your mantra to bring that power into your life. That is the same kind of stuff that Oral Roberts talks about –
bringing power into your life. How do the charismatics go about doing it? They go about doing it by repeating a phrase again and again and
again.
Have you noticed the songs that charismatics are singing? It's not hard to learn the words? You have one line, and it's repeated, and it's
repeated. Do you think that's an accident? It is not. It is Satan imposing upon that deluded system the mantra concept to get people
repeating again and again and again. And Jesus warned about thinking you are going to come into contact with God "for your much speaking."
The charismatics therefore love to use the name of Jesus again and again and again. They love to use the expression, "Hallelujah, hallelujah,
hallelujah," again and again until they have psyched themselves out of their conscious mind. They think that they have had an exhilarating
experience with God. It is a chant. It is a chant to alter their conscious mind, and to open themselves up to influences that are carried by
the spirit world. They get the rational mind out of gear, and the mouth comes under emotional control. That's the design.
It's exactly the same thing in Eastern mysticism – to get the mind out of gear, and to get the mouth into gear with emotional control.
So, Matthew 6:7 gives us a warning, where the Lord Jesus said, "But when you pray, don't use vain repetitions as the pagans do, for they think
that they shall be heard for their much speaking." The Lord Jesus is saying, "That is false." That is not what is going to happen. So, the
doctrine of demons about the mantra is a deceptive doctrine. Don't fall into the pattern of repetitions. You might want to consider repetitious
songs that have a hypnotic effect.
Of course, I need not remind you that rock-n-roll is built upon the same repetitious self-hypnotism. Rock-n-roll is designed to bring you into
contact with spirit powers in the spirit world. Rock-n-roll has rhythms that are designed to counter your heartbeat. That normal 82-rhythm pulse
and the variations that are in rock-n-roll music are deliberately put in there in order to disrupt your normal heartbeat style, and your normal
emotional stability as it is attached to that physical structure within you. It is done by repetition, and by repetition in certain rhythmic
structures. The rhythmic structures are those that are directly interruptive to your heartbeat.
There is an excitable quality in people, and there's a stable quality in people. Some people are more excitable, and some people are more stable.
What rock-n-roll tries to do (and what brainwashing tries to do) is to bring these things into conflict with one another. Here's a teenage girl,
and she's always been taught by her parents that she should not take your clothes off in public. She goes to a rock-n-roll concert. That
inhibition factor in her is there, in her background, by her training. She gets into a rock-n-roll concert, and the whole impact is to break her
inhibitions and to develop her excitement – to play on her excitement stage. So, pretty soon she's screaming; she's crying; she's yelling;
and, she's beside herself. Now she wants to express, in excitement, something that her inhibitions tell her not to do. And finally, this is why
this happens. They start taking their clothes off because the excitement says, "Take your clothes off," but they're distraught and torn when
they do that because their inhibitions say, "Don't do that. That's wrong." And rock-n-roll music is carefully calculated to create that kind
of distraction within the person. The mantra concept of repetition is used for that.
Lenin and Pavlov
You know who put it together. It was our old Russian scientist Pavlov, with his experiments with his dogs, that put all this together. Pavlov was
once invited to Lenin's home, and Lenin said, "I want you to write for me, in an understandable form, what you have learned about controlling
the excitable factor in man, and the inhibitory factors in man. Pavlov sat down and wrote a 400-page manuscript, and when Lenin read it, he
said, "You have saved the revolution." That was because Lenin found early on that he could not force people to do the things that communism
required people to do. It could not force people to do the brutal things to restrict their own freedom, and all of the things that are required.
Lenin said, "There has to be some way that we can get around people, and force them to do what they don't want to do. And Pavlov came up with it.
Pavlov's experiments and his findings are at the heart of rock-n-roll music, which is based on this mantra.
A mantra is a serious thing. It's not just a little cute way of relaxing. Thank God that the Word of God has given us the enlightenment to see
this deception. Everybody around you thinks rock-n-roll is wonderful, and that there's nothing wrong with listening to it. But the Word of God
says it is based upon psychological concepts that are destructive to us.
Dr. John E. Danish, 1982
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