Transmigration or reincarnation which is it to be
The soul transmigrates through eight million four hundred thousand species of life. In the Visnu Purana it says:
jalaja nava-laksni, sthavara laksa-vimsati krmayo Rudra snkhyakah, paksinan dasa-klaksanam trimsal-laksani pasavah, catur-laksani manusah
There are 900,000 aquatic species, 2000,000 species of plants, 1100,000 species of insects and worms, 1000,000 species of birds, 3000,000 species of animals, and 400,000 species of human bengs ,some with different colour skin, hair, eyes, and different levels of consciousness.
Surely reincarnate means come back in the species.
reincarnated b: rebirth in new bodies or forms of life; especially : a rebirth of a soul in a new human body
Reincarnation is an anglicized word of Latin derivation, meaning "reinfleshment," the coming again into a human body of an excarnate soul. The repetitive reimbodiment of the reincarnating Human Ego in vehicles of human flesh -- this being a special case of the general doctrine of Reimbodiement. This general doctrine of Reimbodiement applies not solely to man, but to all centers of consciousness whatsoever, or to all monads whatsoever; wheresoever they may be on the evolutionary ladder of life, and whatsoever may be their particular developmental grade thereon.
The meaning of this general doctrine is very simple indeed. It is as follows: every life-consciousness-center, in other words, every monad or Monadic Essence, reincorporates itself repeatedly in various vehicles or "bodies," to use the popular word. These bodies may be spiritual, or they may be physical, or they may be of a nature intermediate between the these two, i.e., ethereal. This rule of Nature, which applies to all monads without exception, takes place in all the different planes, and in all its different worlds.
There are eight words used in the theosophical philosophy in connection with Reimbodiement, which are not all synonymous, although some of these eight words have almost the same specific meaning. They are: Pre-existence, Rebirth, Reimbodiment, Palingenesis, Metensomatosis, Transmigration, Reincarnation. Of these eight words, four only may be said to contain the four different basic ideas of the general doctrine of Reimbodiement, and these four are Pre-existence, Reimbodiement, Metempsychosis, and Transmigration.
In no case is the word Reincarnation identical with any of the other seven words, though of course it has grounds of strong similarity with them all, as for instance with Pre-existence, because obviously the entity pre-exists before it reincarnates; and on the same grounds it is similar to Rebirth, Reimbodiement, and Metensomatosis
The meaning of the word Reincarnation differs specifically from Rebirth in this, that the latter word simply means rebirth in human bodies of flesh on this Earth; while the former term also contains the implication, tacit if not expressed, of possible incarnations in flesh by entities which have finished their earthly pilgrimages or evolution, but who can and sometimes do return to this Earth in order to incarnate for the purpose of aiding their less evolved brothers.
And transmigration means to move up and down the species both humans and animals.
Metempsychosis
(Greek meta empsychos, Latin metempsychosis: French metempsychose: German seelenwanderung).
Metempsychosis, in other words the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, teaches that the same soul inhabits in succession the bodies of different beings, both men and animals. It was a tenet common to many systems of philosophic thought and religious belief widely separated from each other both geographically and historically. Although in modern times it is associated among civilized races almost exclusively with the countries of Asia and particularly with India, there is evidence that at one period or another it has flourished in almost every part of the world; and it still prevails in variousforms among savage nations scattered over the globe. This universality seems to mark it as one of those spontaneous or instinctive beliefs by which man's nature responds to the deep and urgent problems of existence; whilst the numerous and richly varied forms which it assumes in different systems, and the many-coloured mythology in which it has clothed itself, show it to be capable of powerfully appealing to the imagination, and of adapting itself with great versatility to widely different types of mind. The explanation of this success seems to lie partly in its being an expression of the fundamental belief in immortality, partly in its comprehensiveness, binding together, as for the most part it seems to do, all individual existences in one single, unbroken scheme; partly also in the unrestrained liberty which it leaves to the mythologizing fancy.
History
Egypt
Herodotus tells us in a well-known passage that "the Egyptians were the first to assert the immortality of the soul, and that it passes on the death of the body into another animal; and that when it has gone the round of all forms of life on land, in water, and in air, then it once more enters a human body born for it; and this cycle of the soul takes place in three thousand years" (ii. 123). That the doctrine first originated with the Egyptians is unlikely. It almost certainly passed from Egypt into Greece, but the same belief had sprung up independently in many nations from a very early date. The accounts of Egyptian metempsychosis vary considerably: indeed such a doctrine was bound to undergo modifications according to changes in the national religion. In the "Book of the Dead", it is connected with the notion of a judgment after death, transmigration into infra-human forms being a punishment for sin. Certain animals were recognized by the Egyptians as the abode of specially wicked persons and were on this account, according to Plutarch, preferred for sacrificial purposes. In Herodotus' account given above, this ethical note is absent, and transmigration is a purely natural and necessary cosmic process. Plato's version mediates between these two views. He represents the Egyptians as teaching that ordinary mortals will, after a cycle of ten thousand years, return to the human form, but that an adept in philosophy may hope to accomplish the process in three thousand years. There was also a pantheistic form of Egyptian metempsychosis, the individual being regarded as an emanation from a single universal principle to which it was destined to return after having completed its "cycle of necessity". There are traces of this doctrine of a cosmic cycle in the Fourth Eclogue of Virgil. It has been thought that the custom of embalming the dead was connected with this form of the doctrine, the object being to preserve the body intact for the return of the soul. It is probable, indeed, that the belief in such a return helped to confirm the practice, but it can hardly have provided the sole motive, since we find that other animals were also frequently embalmed.
Greece
Greece, as already stated, probably borrowed the theory of transmigration from Egypt. According to tradition, it had been taught by Musaeus and Orpheus, and it was an element of the Orphic and other mystic doctrines. Pindar represents it in this relation (cf. 2nd Ol. Ode). The introduction of metempsychosis as a philosophical doctrine is due to Pythagoras, who, we are told, gave himself out as identical with the Trojan hero Euphorbos, and added copious details of his subsequent soul-wanderings. Vegetarianism and a general regard for animals was the practical Pythagorean deduction from the doctrine. Plato's metempsychosis was learnt from the Pythagoreans. He gave the doctrine a philosophic standing such as it never before possessed; for Plato exhibits the most elaborate attempt in the history of philosophy to find in the facts of actual experience justification for the theory of the pre-existence of the soul. In particular, sundry arguments adopted later on to prove immortality were employed by him to establish pre-existence. Such were the proofs from universal cognitions and the natural attraction of the soul towards the One, the Permanent, and the Beautiful. Plato ascribes to these arguments a retrospective as well as a prospective force. He seeks to show that learning is but a form of reminiscence, and love but the desire for reunion with a once-possessed good. Man is a fallen spirit, "full of forgetfulness". His sole hope is, by means of education and philosophy, to recover his memory of himself and of truth, and thus free himself from the chains of irrationality that bind him. Thus only can he hasten his return to his "true fatherland" and his perfect assimilation to the Divine. Neglect of this will lead to further and perhaps permanent degradation in the world beyond. The wise man will have an advantageous transmigration because he has practised prudence, and the choice of his next life will be put into his own hands. The vicious, ignorant, and passion-blinded man will, for the contrary reason, find himself bound to a wretched existence in some lower form. Plato's scheme of metempsychosis is conspicuous for the scope it allows to human freedom. The transmigration of the individual soul is no mere episode of a universal world-movement, predestined and unchangeable. Its course is really influenced by character, and character in turn is determined by conduct. A main object of his theory was to guarantee personal continuity of the soul's life, the point in which most other systems of transmigration fail. Besides Plato and Pythagoras, the chief professors of this doctrine among the Greeks were Empedocles, Timaeus of Locri, and the Neoplatonists, none of whom call for detailed notice. Apollonius of Tyana also taught it.
India
The doctrine of transmigration is not found in the oldest of the sacred books of India, viz., the Rig-Veda; but in the later works it appears as an uncontested dogma, and as such it has been received by the two great religions of India.
(1) Brahmanism
In Brahmanism, we find the doctrine of world-cycles, of annihilations and restorations destined to recur at enormous intervals of time; and of this general movement the fortunes of the soul are but an incident. At the same time, transmigrations are determined by moral worth. Every act has its award in some future life. By irreversible law, evil deeds beget unhappiness, sooner or later; these, indeed, are nothing else but the slowly-ripened fruit of conduct, which every man must eat. Thus they explain the anomalies of experience presented in the misfortunes of the good and the prosperity of the wicked: each is "eating the fruit of his past actions", actions done perhaps in some far-remote existence. Such a belief may tend to patience and resignation in present suffering, but it has a distinctly unpleasant effect upon the Brahmanical out-look on the future. A pious Brahman cannot assure himself of happiness
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Lord Dhanavantri in Agni Purana and Sage Vasistha in Brhat Parashara smrti
Hyderabad, June 15: Eminent scientist Richard Dawkins can talk about the ‘God Delusion” but he won’t get much applause from his colleagues in India. For a new study says one in four scientists in India believe firmly that there is a supernatural power up there guiding their destiny. Scientists also strictly follow religious practices and rituals for academic, professional, material and spiritual satisfaction. In all, 50 per cent of the scientists surveyed believe in the efficacy of prayers, as against just 10 per cent of them in the US.