GENDER: It is only in the form life that gender exists

There is no sex (gender), as we understand it, where souls are concerned; it is only in the form life that sex (gender) exists. Thus speak the Wise.

It has been said that all souls incarnate and re-incarnate under the Law of Rebirth, and that the men of today have been women and the women have been men in previous lives. This law of Rebirth is the most sensible explanation given in response to the many unanswered questions we have concerning life, its meaning and purpose. Think it through! How is it possible for a human being to attain the fullness of understanding in one lifetime? How can Man learn the lessons of his being, and the purpose of his existence, in a single life span? It is impossible.

I remember a discussion with a friend some years ago on the question of rebirth. The idea of being born again was too far-fetched to warrant any serious consideration on his part. As Western religions and academic research give so little thought to the subject, he felt justified in his decision to denounce the idea as airy-fairy imaginings. In the heat of the conversation I experienced a momentary flash of realisation: ‘If we are here now in this world, and have taken birth on this planet, why then is it so difficult to accept the idea that we have birthed many times before? If we have done it once – for here we are – why couldn’t we have done it several times before? We don’t know how we came here this time, we don’t know where we were before we came, and we don’t know where we go to after we leave here! It has all just happened! If it has happened once, why can it not happen again, and again, and again?’

The clarity of the revelation was simplicity itself, but he couldn’t see the common sense in the deduction. I suppose if one ignores the existence of the soul, that higher body of light which is quite distinct from the physical body, it then becomes easy to discard all ideas relating to it, for reincarnation implies the rebirth of the soul in another form. If we ignore the very real possibility of the soul, what we are left with is the existence of the physical body alone, and it becomes the beginning and the end of it all!

It is said that each life is not only a recapitulation of life experience, but an assuming of ancient obligations, a recovery of old relations, an opportunity for the paying of old indebtedness, a chance to make restitution and progress, an awakening of deep-seated qualities, the recognition of old friends and enemies, the solution of revolting injustices, and the explanation of that which conditions the man and makes him what he is.

The law of rebirth is the answer to many of life’s paradoxes and is crying out for universal recognition. When it is accepted, finally, as an intelligent hypothesis by thinking people it will help to solve many of our problems. We will come to realise that the soul incarnates in both genders at different times, thus rounding out the ‘negative’ and ‘positive’ aspects of the form life and teaching the soul those lessons that it comes here to learn. The incarnating Life is neither male nor female, but is born into a male or female form in order to experience the unique conditions that each gender creates in the world of men.

Man is no better than the woman, nor woman than the man.

When this law (of rebirth) is admitted as an intelligent principle, we will learn to tread more carefully the path of life and to proceed with greater caution in the fulfilling of our obligations. We will learn to respect each other, not in terms of gender, but for what we are in reality and for where we stand naturally on the evolutionary ladder.