The Bible does not teach reincarnation: it says each person dies only once and then comes judgment, and the hope it offers is the resurrection. The texts most often cited in favor of reincarnation — John the Baptist as Elijah, and being born again — read differently in context, and Jesus himself rejected the idea that a man’s blindness was punishment for his own sins or his parents’.
And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.
The most direct text: it is “appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment”. The writer compares it with Christ, who was offered once — one life, one death and then the meeting with God.
Read the chapter →And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come.
This is the verse most often cited in favor of reincarnation. Jesus says John is the Elijah “which was for to come”, promised in Malachi 4:5, and adds “if ye will receive it” — and Luke’s Gospel explains in what sense (Luke 1:17).
Read the chapter →And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elias must first come? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things. But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them. Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist.
Jesus says Elijah “is come already”, and the disciples understand he means John the Baptist. Yet shortly before, on the mountain, Elijah had appeared as himself, beside Moses (Matthew 17:3), when John was already dead (Matthew 14:10) — and Elijah never died at all: he was taken up to heaven (2 Kings 2:11).
Read the chapter →And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias, 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.
The angel explains to Zechariah in what sense John would be Elijah: he would go “in the spirit and power of Elias”, with the same strength and the same mission of turning the people back to God. It is a continuity of mission, not of person.
Read the chapter →And they asked him, What then? Art thou Elias? And he saith, I am not. Art thou that prophet? And he answered, No.
Asked directly whether he was Elijah, John himself answers: “I am not”. The texts fit together: he was not Elijah in person, but he fulfilled the role Malachi had announced.
Read the chapter →And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.
The disciples assume that blindness from birth is a punishment, for the man’s sin or his parents’. Jesus rejects both — “Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents” — and treats that suffering not as the bill for an earlier sin but as a place for God’s work.
Read the chapter →Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.
Nicodemus also thought of being born a second time from his mother’s womb, and Jesus corrected him: it is being born “of water and of the Spirit”. Being born again is the new life God gives in this life, not a new physical birth.
Read the chapter →Spiritism, widespread in Brazil, sees reincarnation as God’s justice: each person would have many lives to make up for wrongs and grow. It is a sincere answer to real questions, and those who hold it deserve respect. The Bible answers the same questions differently: with grace, which freely forgives what no number of lives could pay for (Ephesians 2:8-9), and with resurrection — the same person, once, transformed for eternal life (1 Corinthians 15:42-44). On this Catholics, Orthodox and evangelicals agree, and the church’s oldest creeds confess the resurrection of the dead, not new lives.
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