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According to Hinduism, Reincarnation (Rebirth) does occur, but it is somewhat related to Karma. Also, I felt that Human is ultimate species in Hinduism, so now the question arises that does god create new souls anymore?

If we see, the population of humans is increasing day by day, so either the souls are new or they are reincarnations of some other species.

Also, if god does create new souls, then does those new souls take birth as humans or some other species? How is that decided? As there is nothing called karma for new souls so he cannot take avatar of any species.

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  • It's a possible duplicate of this question: http://hinduism.stackexchange.com/q/3568/36 See my answer, where I discuss the fact that souls are never created, and they don't have a first birth. – Keshav Srinivasan Nov 15 '14 at 07:12
  • There are no new souls creation is only in the world of relative. Just as different characters come into a dream and disappear the moment we wake up the apparent creation of new bodies is merely an illusion. The moment one realizes ones true Self as Infinite Existence all the creation is identified as a gigantic illusions show. The only reality is the Supreme Being or the Satchidananda. This is advaitist thought. For deeper information about the great illusive movie show of life Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahamsa Yogananda saint can be read – Sai Nov 15 '14 at 22:06
  • "Human is 'ultimate' species..." ONLY ON EARTH. BTW This is a good question for Christianity.SE or Islam.SE because there is NO rebirth concept in Abrahamic religions. – Hindu Nov 16 '14 at 10:07

2 Answers2

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Souls are never actually created; here is what Krishna tells Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita:

Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be.... For the soul there is neither birth nor death at any time. He has not come into being, does not come into being, and will not come into being. He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing and primeval.

As to your question regarding what determines the experiences of a soul's first birth, Adi Shankaracharya provides an answer to this in his Brahma Sutra Bhashya: the issue never arises, because there is never a first birth for the soul. The number of births of the soul is infinite, so the karma of each birth is determined by the actions of the soul in its previous birth, going infinitely far back in time:

[F]or although the activity of the soul is not independent, yet the soul does act. The Lord indeed causes it to act, but it acts itself. Moreover, the Lord in causing it to act now has regard to its former efforts, and he caused it to act in a former existence, having regard to its efforts previous to that existence; a regressus against which, considering the eternity of the samsâra, no objections can be raised.

So to sum up, there is never a time where the soul starts out with a "blank slate" and is put in circumstances it did not deserve. The soul doesn't have a starting point, any more than Vishnu has a starting point.

Keshav Srinivasan
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  • I'm having some difficulties in understanding what you mean--if Brahman causes the jiva to act, wouldn't that mean Ishwara would be ultimately responsible for any wrongdoing? And how could the jiva be free to act despite its action being ultimately caused by Brahman? – AdityaS Jul 17 '15 at 19:00
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    @Aditya Well, the thing is that Brahman causes the jivatma to act, but Brahman is not being capricious in how he causes it to act - Brahman chooses what actions the jivatma should do based on the actions it did in a previous birth. In any case, the question of whether the jivatma is "free" to act is a difficult question. The jivatma is not free in the sense of acting independent of Brahman, but it is free to act in the sense that the way Brahman makes the jivatma act is determined by the jivatma. – Keshav Srinivasan Jul 17 '15 at 19:12
  • @Aditya By the way, I hope I didn't give the impression in my answer that this is a doctrine unique to Adi Shankaracharya; Madhvacharya says the same thing in his commentary on the Brahma Sutras: http://gdurl.com/RPUK – Keshav Srinivasan Jul 17 '15 at 19:32
  • @Aditya In any case, the key point is the beginninglessness of the process. If there was a first birth for the Jivatma, then your objection would be valid, because Brahman would be arbitrarily choosing what the Jivatma does in its first birth, and then would be making it do actions in subsequent births based on what Brahman made it do in the first birth. If that were the case then yes Brahman would be responsible for any wrongdoing done by the Jivatma. But the actual situation is that there is no first birth for the Jivatma, so its chain of behavior is in some sense "uncaused" and thus "free". – Keshav Srinivasan Jul 17 '15 at 19:50
  • But if our actions are based on actions in our previous life, wouldn't that limit progress toward higher moral situation and then eventually moksha? How can I be a good person in this life if I was a bad one in the past one. – AdityaS Jul 18 '15 at 02:45
  • @Aditya I think you're assuming that doing good deeds in one birth can only lead to doing equally good deeds in the next birth. That's not how it works. Doing a good deed now might make you do even greater good deeds in a future birth. Like worshipping Vishnu now might get you born into a virtuous family, and it might make you born with better gunas, such that you'll become an even greater Vishnu bhakta in your next birth. See the end of Bhagavad Gita chapter 6: http://www.vedabase.com/bg/6 – Keshav Srinivasan Jul 18 '15 at 02:58
  • Alright, thank you! I just wasn't sure how that progression and causation of action by Brahman were related exactly. But that leads me to another question: if someone were to do bad deeds in this life, how could they ever do good deeds if they were to fall into a cycle of doing bad deeds, and then doing worse deeds in the next life? – AdityaS Jul 18 '15 at 12:44
  • @Aditya Well, in the philosophy of Madhvacharya that you follow, there are actually people who are destined to go in a vicious cycle of committing sins in birth after birth until their sins become so great that they fall into Andhatamas and undergo eternal punishment. Madhvacharya called such people Tamo-Yogyas. But other Hindus don't believe in these notions of Tamo-Yogyas and Andhatamas. – Keshav Srinivasan Jul 18 '15 at 14:44
  • @Aditya In any case, if you do all bad deeds your current birth, that would certainly hinder your progress, but that doesn't automatically mean that you'll go into a vicious cycle. After all, you could have done good deeds two births ago, and those may lead you to do good things in your next birth. Also, it's hard to predict how karma will bear fruit. Sometimes doing an action will cause you to do some other action in a future birth. Other times doing an action will make you experience something good or bad in a future birth. And it's hard to predict when it will bear fruit. – Keshav Srinivasan Jul 18 '15 at 14:50
  • If someone does so many bad deeds that in the next life the jiva gets lower birth(animals etc..) then how will he come back again to human form? Because I don't think there is a good or bad deed for animal. He has to kill animals to survive, if that's considered a good deed then what will be called a bad deed for them? If there is no difference between good and bad for them then they will be forever stuck in lower births. – Pinakin Dec 30 '15 at 13:51
  • @ChinmaySarupria Well, there's a large stock of Sanchita Karma which have accumulated from a person's infinitely many past births, and then in each birth a person experiences a small amount of that stock, known as the Prarabdha Karma. If a person does bad actions in their current birth, then in their next birth they may be born as an animal, but then in their subsequent birth they may be born as a human again due to the good actions they did three births ago. It's hard to predict which Karmas in the Sanchita Karma will become Prarabdha Karma for which birth. – Keshav Srinivasan Dec 30 '15 at 13:59
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    Don't know why sane people like Swami & you subscribe to Shankara's commentary as genuine instead of someone's interpolation. Though we have discussed before in chat, here putting for reference reason for coverting my upvote to downvote. Almost everyone in Indian spirituality accepts "Moksha" exists (for whatever time). "Infinite" never finishes. If something finishes then it's not "infinite". By saying "Jiva has infinite (past) births", the possibility of Moksha is refuted. Our life is lived sequentially. To finish infinite births, it takes forever to attain Moksha. – iammilind Apr 03 '16 at 14:17
  • @iammilind I do not subscribe to Adi Shankaracharya's commentary; I am a Sri Vaishnava. But this is an issue where all the commentaries on the Brahma Sutras are in agreement. In any case, the notion of infinite past births does not contradict the possibility of Moksha in any way, shape, or form. Starting from the present moment, the births of a Jiva are infinite going backward in time, but finite going forward in time. It's just like in the set of real numbers less than or equal to 10, there are infinitely many integers less than 0, but only finitely many integers between 0 and 10. – Keshav Srinivasan Apr 03 '16 at 14:21
  • @iammilind Please tell me if there's anything you don't understand in my real numbers explanation. – Keshav Srinivasan Apr 03 '16 at 14:25
  • @KeshavSrinivasan, actually we have discussed this before in chat to no conclusion. But since you asked, here is my take. 10 is not infinite. What I don't understand is, if we live births 1 by 1, then how can we finish infinte births & attain Moksha? If you convince me on this, I will re-upvote & delete my comments. Instead of spoiling your answer area, you may want to ping me on any of our previous chat rooms & put a link here. But if we will deviate to other things except above Q then it won't be fruitful like last time. :-) BTW, I will be out for at least 1+ hours from now. – iammilind Apr 03 '16 at 14:36
  • @iammilind The fact that 10 is not infinite is precisely the point. In any case, I don't want to interrupt your conversation with Sai, so I just started a new chat room. – Keshav Srinivasan Apr 03 '16 at 14:40
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Yes, as outlined by the other answers the souls is not created, but it is eternal. This is agreed upon by all the schools of Vedanta and has been commented on by Sankara, Bhaskara, Ramanuja, Madhva, and Vallabha.

Madhava says that the Vedanta Sutras (II. iii. 11-50) that refer to its birth are in reference to its Upadhis, the body, etc.

Ramanuja says that souls have existed from all eternity as a mode (prakara) of Brahman. Sutra texts (II. iii. 17) that speak of their creation only mean the expansion of intelligence.

Bhaskara interprets the same verse as meaning differentiation due to Upadhis.

Sankara says the jiva is simply the appearance of Brahman in the individual but in reality they are one.

The Upanishads deny any birth to the soul. See Katha (I. ii. 18) and Brhadaranyaka (IV. iv. 25)

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