Pariprashnena — Q&A Archive

Yes, I feel the trauma explanation is too simplistic, kinda fast street preaching. Anyone?

dont know--the only thing i remember reading somewhere in srila prabhupadas books is this forgetting thru shock thing. can only speculate any further.

memory, remembrance of things that happened, people, all that, _is_ connected to the brain, somehow. i dont really know how, and i think todays scientists dont either. theyre trying to come up with speculations, neurons this, chemical reactions that, but they seem to be tapping around in the dark pretty much.

still, if you hit your head hard enough, its likely you get amnesia, your memory is gone--part of it, all of it, for some time, or forever. so its got to do something with the brain.

now when we are about to get a new body, hanging for some days in pitrloka or wherever, we dont have our brains with us. theres the soul, and the subtle body, but does that contain all our memories, in exactly the same form as we experienced them during our previous life?

i read that the subtle bodies carries our previous desires and stuff over into the next one, but the exact memories seem to be more a function of the brain. if youre re-born as an ant, youll experience things much different, and therefore remember them different, from what a human would. so if exact memories are carried over from one life to the next, that seems to me rather the exception, something that wouldnt normally happen, only if theres a particular reason for it.

sorry for ranting, its all speculation of course, but this question made me think for a while...would be interesting to hear what VEDA has to say about this.

...remembering some more--or rather remembering what i dont remember. should look this up in the folio, but im too lazy now (!:42 AM).

-- remember reading that forgetting our past lives is krsnas mercy, otherwise we would be overwhelmed;

--remember that in the womb things get very tight, almost intolerable, we pray to krsna and actually get his darsan. promise to worship him, but when we get out, all thats forgotten due to the joy of life;

-- DONt remember if what we forget during the shock of birth is our experience in the womb, or the previous lifes. certainly theres a shock: if it was intolerable in the womb, its much more so in the birth channel. (what happens during cesarean, then?)

thing is, as a baby in the womb, we wont remember things the same way we do as adults. very different frame of reference, no words, nothing to compare our experience with.

what happened in pitrloka, when yamaraja read us our accounts, what type of mind / intelligence do we have at that time? how does the baby in the womb relate to that?

i think its all quite different from what we experience in this human body, from what we consciously remember from our present lives...

I dont know how it is that we forget but I do know it must be Krishnas mercy that we do not remember our past lives. It would be horrid to remember all things we did and went thru. Plus the over-load on our brains! We are already insane enough without all that memory of past lives swirling around us.

"The precarious condition of the living entity within the womb of his mother is described here. On one side of where the child is floating is the heat of gastric fire, and on the other side are urine, stool, blood and discharges. After seven months the child, who has regained his consciousness, feels the horrible condition of his existence and prays to the Lord. Counting the months until his release, he becomes greatly anxious to get out of the confinement".sb 3.31.17 purp.

for forgetfulness at the time of birth see sb 3.31.20 and sb 3.31.23-24 (it is not about past lifes memories)

The memory is a part of our subtle body. You can compare the subtle and physical body to software and hardware of your computer (yantra). Brain is the place where the activity of the subtle body can be measured (encephalograph). When the hardware is broken, the software cant work effectively. When software goes haywire, the hardware malfunctions as well.
You as their user are separate from them yet dependent on them in this world to interact with it.
And beyond you is the Admin who controls all bodies - Paramatma. He regulates prana (a part of the subtle body) which has the role of the electricity and He assigns you a new comp when needed.
This is the best analogy I came up so far. ;)

Yes, there is more to it than just shock. The reason for forgetting past lives is primarily due to the development of the gross material body.

The gross body is required to fulfill the desires held in the subtle body; "The desires in the subtle body of mind, intelligence and ego cannot be fulfilled without a gross body composed of the material elements earth, water, air, fire and ether. When the gross material body is not manifest, the living entity cannot factually act in the modes of material nature." (SB 4.29.70 purport)

As the jiva in the womb does not have a developed gross body, its subtle desires have no facility to manifest; "When a living entity is within the womb, his gross body, the ten sense organs and the mind are not fully developed. At such a time the objects of the senses do not disturb him." (SB 4.29.72 purport)

But at the time of birth the jiva becomes fully engaged in the gross and subtle senses and loses its undisturbed state of consciousness; "... the living entity is very much afraid of being born again, but when he is out of the womb, when he is in full life and good health, he forgets everything and commits again and again the same sins for which he was put into that horrible condition of existence." (3.31.11 purport)

Therefore the main cause of the loss of memory of past lives is the intoxication of bodily identification which forcefully captures the attention of the consciousness and covers it with the illusion of identification with the gross and subtle body. Upon being born, the jiva has a better functioning gross body and all the previous desires held in the subtle body can start to manifest thereby deviating the jiva from his clear consciousness.

This process of desires manifesting according to to the development of the gross body continues throughout the life of the jiva. For example, "Because of undeveloped senses, a child or boy will not see a young woman in his dreams.(SB 4.29.72 purport)

According to Sri Krsnas statement in SB 11.15.28, the power of gaining the memory of our past lives, and of others past lives, can be regained by "...a yogi who has purified his existence by devotion to Me and who thus expertly knows the process of meditation." This endeavour is later called kala-kshapana, a waste of time, for anyone who is seriously practising bhakti indicating that this particular mystic power is a only by-product of bhakti, and not the goal.

"The Lord is conscious of all of His previous appearances and disappearances, but a common living entity forgets everything about his past body as soon as he gets another body. "

"The Lord has spoken about the peculiarity of His birth: although He may appear like an ordinary person, He remembers everything of His many, many past "births," whereas a common man cannot remember what he has done even a few hours before. If someone is asked what he did exactly at the same time one day earlier, it would be very difficult for a common man to answer immediately. He would surely have to dredge his memory to recall what he was doing exactly at the same time one day before. And yet, men often dare claim to be God, or Krsna. One should not be misled by such meaningless claims. "

PURPORT Chaper 4 Verse 6 Srimad Bhagavad Gita As It Is

"Devotees like Arjuna are constant companions of the Lord, and whenever the Lord incarnates, the associate devotees also incarnate in order to serve the Lord in different capacities. Arjuna is one of these devotees, and in this verse it is understood that some millions of years ago when Lord Krsna spoke the Bhagavad-gita to the sun-god Vivasvan, Arjuna, in a different capacity, was also present. But the difference between the Lord and Arjuna is that the Lord remembered the incidence, whereas Arjuna could not remember. That is the difference between the part and parcel living entity and the Supreme Lord. Although Arjuna is addressed herein as the mighty hero who could subdue the enemies, he is unable to recall what had happened in his various past births. Therefore, a living entity, however great he may be in the material estimation, can never equal the Supreme Lord. Anyone who is a constant companion of the Lord is certainly a liberated person, but he cannot be equal to the Lord"
Purport Ch.4, verse 5

How can I expect to remember my past life? I cant even remember where I put my car keys ---- AND I DONT EVEN DRIVE!!!!!!!!!!

Three old ladies are sitting in a diner, chatting about various things. One lady says, "You know, Im getting really forgetful. This morning, I was standing at the top of the stairs, and I couldnt remember whether I had just come up or was about to go down." The second lady says, "You think thats bad? The other day, I was sitting on the edge of my bed, and I couldnt remember whether I was going to bed or had just waken up!" The third lady smiles smugly. "Well, my memorys just as good as its always been, knock on wood." She raps the table. With a startled look on her face, she asks, "Whos there?!"