…….another fact I find in the study of the various religions of the world is that there are three different stages of ideas with regard to the soul and God. In the first place, all religions admit that, apart from the body which perishes, there is a certain part or something which does not change like the body, a part that is immutable, eternal, that never dies; but some of the later religions teach that although there is a part of us that never dies, it had a beginning. But anything that has a beginning must necessarily have an end. We — the essential part of us — never had a beginning, and will never have an end. And above us all, above this eternal nature, there is another eternal Being, without end — God.
People talk about the beginning of the world, the beginning of man. The wordbeginning simply means the beginning of the cycle. It nowhere means the beginning of the whole Cosmos. It is impossible that creation could have a beginning. No one of you can imagine a time of beginning. That which has a beginning must have an end. “Never did I not exist, nor you, nor will any of us ever hereafter cease to be,” says the Bhagavad-Gita. Wherever the beginning of creation is mentioned, it means the beginning of a cycle. Your body will meet with death, but your soul, never. (I, 318-319)
One thing that we have to remember is that the Soul is not only eternal but it is perfect too. Man made himself impure by his own actions. There is no point in blaming God for it. He must regain his old pure nature. How? By knowing God, by living in God. Closely connected with these ideas is the doctrine of reincarnation which is now becoming more and more popular in the West.
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