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Soon shall ye see the friends attaining their longed-for destination and pitching their tents, while we are but in the first day of our journey. (642:1) I read what flowed from thy pen in the love of God, and found charming meanings from the contents (of thy letter). I hope, through the gift of the glorious Lord, that thou wilt be always refreshed and revived by the fragrances of the Merciful. (642:2) As to what thou hast written concerning "Reincarnation": Believing in reincarnation is one of the old tenets held by most nations and creeds, as well as by the Greek and Roman philosophers and wise men, the old Egyptians and the chief Assyrians. But all these sayings and superstitions are vanity in the sight of God. (642:3) The greatest [argument] produced by those who held to reincarnation has been this: "That it is necessary to the justice of God to give every one his due. Now everybody who is afflicted by any calamity is said to have sinned; but when a little child, which is still in the womb of its mother and hath just been formed, is found to be blind, deaf or imperfect, how could it have committed any sin that we might say this imperfection is given to it as a punishment therefor-- so, though such a child hath not done outwardly any sin in the womb of its mother, yet [they say] it must have sinned when it was in its former body, which hath caused it to suffer this punishment."
(642:4)
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