Steve April
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2/25/2023 6:31:33 PM
---- Updated 2/26/2023 5:51:31 PM
Bob mentions/believes in transmigration of souls (according to a 2012 interview in Rolling Stone, anyway).
Here's about this..."shot away like stars to their brith..".
Orphism
The Orphic religion, which held it, first appeared in Thrace upon the semi-barbarous northeastern frontier. Orpheus, its legendary founder, is said to have taught that soul and body are united by a compact unequally binding on either; the soul is divine, immortal and aspires to freedom, while the body holds it in fetters as a prisoner. Death dissolves this compact, but only to reimprison the liberated soul after a short time, for the wheel of birth revolves inexorably. Thus the soul continues its journey, alternating between a separate unrestrained existence and fresh reincarnation, round the wide circle of necessity, as the companion of many bodies of men and animals. To these unfortunate prisoners Orpheus proclaims the message of liberation—that they stand in need of the grace of redeeming gods, Dionysus in particular—and calls them to turn to the gods by ascetic piety and self-purification: the purer their lives, the higher will be their next reincarnation, until the soul has completed the spiral ascent of destiny to live forever as a God from whom it comes. Such was the teaching of Orphism, which appeared in Greece about the 6th century BCE, organized itself into private and public mysteries at Eleusis and elsewhere, and produced copious literature.[5][6][7]
Platonic philosophy
The real weight and importance of metempsychosis in the Western tradition are due to its adoption by Plato.[9] In the eschatological myth that closes the Republic, he tells how Er, the son of Armenius, miraculously returned to life on the 12th day after death and recounted the secrets of the other world. After death, he said, he went with others to the place of Judgment and saw the souls returning from heaven, and proceeded with them to a place where they chose new lives, human and animal. He saw the soul of Orpheus changing into a swan, Thamyras becoming a nightingale, musical birds choosing to be men, and Atalanta choosing the honours of an athlete. Men were seen passing into animals and wild and tame animals changing into each other. After their choice, the souls drank of Lethe and then shot away like stars to their birth. There are myths and theories to the same effect in other dialogues, including the Phaedrus, Meno, Phaedo, Timaeus, and Laws.[citation needed] In Plato's view the number of souls was fixed; souls are never created, but only transmigrate from one body to another.[10]
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