Haibane Renmei (SPOILER ALERT)

[Amethyst]

Obviously I have little background in this, but how exactly does reincarnation work? Does anyone here believe in this? Obviously there must be many animals made into people because the growth rate of people is staggering. Whether you're good or bad determines what you will be in the next life I assume, but how does it determine if an animal is good or bad or what you (or an animal) needs to do to be a human again.

Ok, first off, this is just my opinion, so nobody jump on me because I mis-phrased something or didn't make it quite clear... and yes, I believe in reincarnation and karma, and no, I don't have to prove any of it just because someone wants proof... it's called faith... the belief in something you can't readily prove exists, so I'm not going to argue about it or have to defend myself.

Reincarnation is where you as a soul (souls are neither male or female (but may have a preference) and chose what sex they wish to be before birth) are reborn onto the Earth (or other planets, you can believe this or not as the case may be) many, many times. Each lifetime is a chance for atonement from previous lifetimes and/or an opportunity to learn and grow to better yourself. Eventually you will reach the point where you no longer have to be reincarnated into a new life. The Good and Bad part is Karma which simply stated you get returned to you what you give out to others, it may not be in this lifetime, but in the next or even farther down the line, whether good or bad... but you do have to account for yourself.

Now my religion taught that only humans can be humans, and only animals can be animals.. etc. But I personally believe that humans can be animals, and vise versa... (because at the time the question was raised, I don't think most people in our group could handle that kind of information of possibly being an animal in a lifetime, for that matter, I don't think most people could handle it either) I think when a human is reincarnated into an animal, it is a sort of simplified learning process or a time off from trying to strive for perfection... since animals are usually about surviving...but some are just for giving unconditional love, and if you look at the reverse, there are some humans that just don't seem to fit in as humans, these would be animals reincarnated into human form... as to why, I suppose they need to accomplish something they couldn't as an animal, or it could be because animals are becoming scarce and so can't reincarnate back into another animal form and so must choose human form.

Let me state something else... Animals or humans for that matter, are neither good or bad... it is their actions which are good or bad, and that is based solely on others pre-conceived notions of good/bad, or even on one's own belief of good/bad. For example... a dog bites someone because it is afraid and trying to protect itself... we would term it a bad dog because we got bit... but is that necessarily the case?

Perhaps it has to do with the individual consciousness... we make choices every day that may be good or bad, and even if we know that it is bad or wrong, we still have that choice to do so... There is no definitive scale for good/bad, although there are plenty of things that most people would agree to as being either good or bad... with plenty of gray areas in between...