KARMA AND REINCARNATION - the concept of reincarnation and karma is incompatible with what the Bible teaches about life, death, and the sowing and reaping of eternal life - “Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment…” - Karma is the idea that how you live your life will determine the quality of life you will have after reincarnation. If you are unselfish, kind, and holy during this lifetime, you will be rewarded by being reincarnated (reborn into a new earthly body) into a pleasant life. However, if you live a life of selfishness and evil, you will be reincarnated into a less-than-pleasant lifestyle. You reap in the next life what you sow in this one. The Bible rejects the idea of reincarnation; therefore, it does not support the idea of karma. We are “destined to die once,” meaning that humans are only born once and only die once. There is no endless cycle of life and death and rebirth. After death we face judgment, meaning that there is no second chance. You get one shot at life and living it according to God’s plan, and that is it. The Bible talks a lot about reaping and sowing. It was Jesus whose death on the cross resulted in the reaping of eternal life for us, and that it is faith in Jesus that gives us this eternal life.

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Karma

And Reincarnation

What does the Bible say about karma

the concept of reincarnation and karma is incompatible with what the Bible teaches about life, death, and the sowing and reaping of eternal life and reaping of eternal life

Got Questions Ministries

 “Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment…” - Hebrews 9:27 

Karma is a theological concept found in the Buddhist and Hindu religions.

It is the idea that how you live your life will determine the quality of life you will have after reincarnation.

If you are unselfish, kind, and holy during this lifetime, you will be rewarded by being reincarnated (reborn into a new earthly body) into a pleasant life.

However, if you live a life of selfishness and evil, you will be reincarnated into a less-than-pleasant lifestyle.

In other words, you reap in the next life what you sow in this one. Karma is based on the theological belief in reincarnation.

The Bible rejects the idea of reincarnation; therefore, it does not support the idea of karma.

Hebrews 9:27 states, “Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment…”

This Bible verse makes clear two important points which, for Christians, negate the possibility of reincarnation and karma.

First, it states that we are “destined to die once,” meaning that humans are only born once and only die once.

There is no endless cycle of life and death and rebirth, an idea inherent in the reincarnation theory.

Second, it states that after death we face judgment, meaning that there is no second chance, like there is in reincarnation and karma, to live a better life.

You get one shot at life and living it according to God’s plan, and that is it.

The Bible talks a lot about reaping and sowing.

Job 4:8 says, “As I have observed, those who plow evil and those who sow trouble reap it.”

Psalm 126:5 says, “Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy.” 

Luke 12:24 says, “Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!”

In each of these instances, as well as all the other references to reaping and sowing, the act of receiving the rewards of your actions takes place in this life, not in some future life.

It is a present-day activity, and the references make it clear that the fruit you reap will be commensurate with the actions you have performed.

In addition, the sowing you perform in this life will affect your reward or punishment in the afterlife.

This afterlife is not a rebirth or a reincarnation into another body here on earth. It is either eternal suffering in hell (Matthew 25:46) or eternal life in heaven with Jesus, who died so that we might live eternally with Him.

This should be the focus of our life on earth.

The apostle Paul wrote in Galatians 6:8-9, “The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

Finally, we must always remember that it was Jesus whose death on the cross resulted in the reaping of eternal life for us, and that it is faith in Jesus that gives us this eternal life. 

Ephesians 2:8-9 tells us, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Therefore, we see that the concept of reincarnation and karma is incompatible with what the Bible teaches about life, death, and the sowing and reaping of eternal life.

Got Questions Ministries seeks to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ by providing biblical, applicable, and timely answers to spiritually related questions through an internet presence."
GotQuestions.org is a ministry of dedicated and trained servants who have a desire to assist others in their understanding of God, Scripture, salvation, and other spiritual topics. We are Christian, Protestant, evangelical, theologically conservative, and non-denominational. We view ourselves as a para-church ministry, coming alongside the church to help people find answers to their spiritually related questions.

https://www.gotquestions.org/karma.html

RESURRECTION AND AFTERLIFE - When God’s people died they would be with God (in some sense hard to define, and they didn’t try to define it), until the dawn of the ‘new age’ or ‘the age to come’, at which point all God’s people would be given new bodies to share in that new world. The Sadducees didn’t believe in that eventual transformation of the world or of human beings; and so they didn’t believe, either, in any post mortem ongoing existence. Resurrection was a dramatic and revolutionary doctrine; the Sadducees, being the conservative aristocrats, were naturally anxious about it. What we have in Jesus’ conversation with the Sadducees was of this sort. Jesus pointed out that God wouldn’t define himself in terms of non-existent people; ‘memory’ is not good enough to do the job.

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Resurrection and Afterlife

by N.T. Wright

Question: What can reasonably be known about the views of the afterlife and resurrection held by Jesus, the Pharisees, and the Sadducees? In particular, why would the Sadducees have found Jesus’s answer adequate in Luke 20:27-40?

Answer:  The point about Jesus’ reply to the Sadducees’ question is

- (a) that Jesus was going back to the Torah itself (the five books of Moses) which were the only ones the very conservative Sadducees regarded as really authoritative, and

- (b) that God defines himself there in terms of his relationship to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

The underlying point is that God would not define himself in relationship to people who were now non-existent.

From all that we can work out (the evidence is found in various places, from Maccabees to Acts to Josephus to the Rabbis) that the Pharisees in Jesus’ day believed in bodily resurrection.

That is, that when God’s people died they would be with God (in some sense hard to define, and they didn’t try to define it), until the dawn of the ‘new age’ or ‘the age to come’, at which point all God’s people would be given new bodies to share in that new world.

The Sadducees, as far as we can tell, didn’t believe in that eventual transformation of the world or of human beings; and so they didn’t believe, either, in any post mortem ongoing existence.

Resurrection was a dramatic and revolutionary doctrine; the Sadducees, being the conservative aristocrats, were naturally anxious about it.

Many Jewish debates function like chess matches: when it’s obvious that one side is in a winning position, you don’t bother to play out the final moves.

(A glance through Danby’s edition of the Mishnah makes this point; often, he has to put a footnote in explaining, for those of us who are struggling to keep up, that the point just made meant that the argument was basically over.)

What we have in Jesus’ conversation with the Sadducees was of this sort. Jesus pointed out that God wouldn’t define himself in terms of non-existent people; ‘memory’ is not good enough to do the job.

But — and this is the bit we don’t hear, the last moves of the game which all parties in the discussion recognized — if they are alive this must be because God will in fact raise them from the dead.

Modern western readers find this odd because we are mostly Platonists at heart, unused to thinking of bodily resurrection, content with a vague ‘life after death’.

That is not the point here. The challenge of reading the New Testament is to get back into the minds of first-century Jews who really did believe that God created a good world and that he really would put it right at last — including raising people from the dead.  

For further reading, you might try The Resurrection of the Son of God (2003) and Surprised by Hope (2007) both by N.T. Wright. 

N.T. Wright, "Resurrection and Afterlife", n.p. [cited 22 Apr 2019]. Online: http://bibleodyssey.org/tools/ask-a-scholar/resurrection-and-afterlife

N.T. Wright
Professor, University of St. Andrews

N.T. Wright is professor of New Testament and early christianity at the University of St. Andrews. He is an Anglican priest and former Bishop of Durham. His numerous publications, both academic and popular, include most recently Paul and the Faithfulness of God (Fortress, 2013). 

http://bibleodyssey.org/en/tools/ask-a-scholar/resurrection-and-afterlife 

 Sadducees Ask About the Resurrection

²⁷ There came to him some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, ²⁸ and they asked him a question, saying, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the widow and raise up offspring for his brother. 

²⁹ Now there were seven brothers. The first took a wife, and died without children. ³⁰ And the second ³¹ and the third took her, and likewise all seven left no children and died. 

³² Afterward the woman also died. ³³ In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had her as wife.”

³⁴ And Jesus said to them, “The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, ³⁵ but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, ³⁶ for they cannot die anymore, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. 

³⁷ But that the dead are raised, even Moses showed, in the passage about the bush, where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. 

³⁸ Now he is not God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him.” 

³⁹ Then some of the scribes answered, “Teacher, you have spoken well.”⁴⁰ For they no longer dared to ask him any question.

 

Luke 20:27-40 English Standard Version (ESV)

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+20%3A27-40&version=ESV

HEAVEN WITH OUR LOVED ONES - It is our most anticipated desire to be reunited with our loved ones in Christ who have departed before us. Only those who believe in Christ and His finished work on the Cross looks at the afterlife with hope - the rest of the unbelieving mankind are excluded in this promise. There would be exceeding joy as we recognize one another in our heavenly glorified bodies.

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Loved 

Ones In Heaven

How shall we recognize our loved ones in heaven?

puricarefiles 

How sure are we that we will recognize our loved ones who have gone to heaven ahead of us?

What does the Bible say about this?

It is our most anticipated desire to be reunited with our loved ones in Christ who have departed before us.

The Bible has many texts to prove that those who died in Christ are in heaven, waiting for the resurrection of their physical bodies.

In the Old Testament, departed believers are often referred to as being “gathered to his people” (Genesis 25:8;35:29; 49:29; Numbers 20:24; Judges 2:10). 

Believers who leave this world will be recognizable and known in the next life.

King David offered words of comfort regarding the loss of his own infant son.

David said, “But now that he is dead, why should I go on fasting? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:23). 

David expected to see his son in heaven and be able to recognize him.

Jesus gives an account of Lazarus and a rich man in Luke 16:19-31. Both men died.

Lazarus was by “Abraham’s side,” (verse 23).

And the rich man was, “in Hades, where he was in torment.” 

We are told, “He looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side” (verse 23).

The rich man could still recognize Lazarus. Abraham even recognized the rich man, though he was in torment.

Elijah and Moses were clearly recognized by Peter, James, and John at the Transfiguration (Mark 9:4-5).

These are proofs in the Bible that we will recognize the  departed saints dear to us in the next life.

There is a forthcoming event that we are looking forward to with expectancy, when the Lord will come to take us and the bodies of our departed ones – the Rapture (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18).

The apostle Paul addresses what will happen when Jesus returns for His followers.

Paul begins by declaring, “Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope” (verse 13). 

Only those who believe in Christ and His finished work on the Cross looks at the afterlife with hope - the rest of the unbelieving mankind are excluded in this promise.

Paul clearly says that believers will be reunited with those who have preceded them in death: “After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever” (verse 17). 

Exceeding Joy Awaiting

There would be exceeding joy as we recognize one another in our heavenly glorified bodies.

Jesus also taught, “I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 8:11). 

In the Millennial kingdom, the Old Testament saints will be known and recognizable.

We can expect that other believers will be known and recognized by us as well.

Jesus was recognized by more than 500 people following his Resurrection.

Although he had the ability to disguise himself, He was clearly recognized at other times (Luke 24:13-16). 

When Thomas the doubter saw Jesus, he immediately responded, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28).

Since believers will have glorified bodies like the one Jesus has, we have convincing proofs that we will recognize one another in heaven (Philippians 3:21).

Knowing what our eternal future is, how do we establish relations with the One who is the Way to heaven?

Ephesians 2:8 declares, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God."

We can be saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone. All our works, no matter how righteous, have nothing to do with salvation. 

We must believe that Jesus died in our place and rose from the dead (Romans 10:9-10). 

It is only faith in Jesus' death and resurrection that can save us.

If you acknowledge to God that you are a sinner and in need of salvation through Jesus Christ say this prayer.

“Father God, I confess I am a sinner and my sins have separated me from You.

I am truly sorry. I now want to turn away from my past sinful life and live a new life pleasing to You. I receive Your free gift of salvation.

Please forgive me, and help me avoid sinning again.

I believe that Your Son, Jesus Christ died for my sins, was resurrected from the dead, is alive, and hears my prayer.

I invite Jesus to become the Lord of my life, to rule and reign in my heart from this day forward. Thank You that according to your Word, I am now born again, has eternal life, and I am now Your child.

Please send Your Holy Spirit to help me obey You, and to do Your will for the rest of my life. I promise to study Your Word – the Bible.

Please use me for Your glory.

In Jesus' Name I pray. Amen.”

If you have just put your trust in Jesus Christ, you have been born into God’s family.

As a spiritual baby, you need to grow by feeding on God’s Word – the Bible (1 Peter 2:2).

You must have a good modern translation Bible and begin prayerfully reading it. Start in the New Testament, such as the Gospel of John or Paul’s letters to the Ephesians.

Also, you need to join a Christian fellowship where the Bible is taught and where God is truly worshiped.

God bless you as you begin your new life with Him!