DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post

**appleiphoneees** · 05-05-2012, 04:10 AM

The belief that people have souls or spirits seems to have been very widespread, though in many cases the belief was that these spirits recycled.

I once read a set of explanations for how this belief may have arisen, and been reinforced.

One concerned women's experiences: they knew they were pregnant when menstruation ceased, but a few months later, they felt the child move in their womb, and this was explained by a spirit entering the developing child.

Two stemmed from vivid dreams: people sometimes dreamed that they did various things in some far away place that their body obviously hadn't been to in the night, so the explantion was that their spirit did those things while they were sleeping. The other was that people sometimes had a vivid dream in which a dead person being active featured: this was explained as the spirit of the dead person returning.

The final one concerned observing someone's death: the person was alive, and then they were dead. This was explained as the spirit leaving the body.

05-05-2012, 04:10 AM	#1
appleiphoneees Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 541 Senior Member	The belief that people have souls or spirits seems to have been very widespread, though in many cases the belief was that these spirits recycled. I once read a set of explanations for how this belief may have arisen, and been reinforced. One concerned women's experiences: they knew they were pregnant when menstruation ceased, but a few months later, they felt the child move in their womb, and this was explained by a spirit entering the developing child. Two stemmed from vivid dreams: people sometimes dreamed that they did various things in some far away place that their body obviously hadn't been to in the night, so the explantion was that their spirit did those things while they were sleeping. The other was that people sometimes had a vivid dream in which a dead person being active featured: this was explained as the spirit of the dead person returning. The final one concerned observing someone's death: the person was alive, and then they were dead. This was explained as the spirit leaving the body.
	Quote