Должен признать, что теория реинкарнации всегда вызывала у меня отторжение своим читерским характером. В этом же варианте все выглядит и вовсе плохо. Однако поскольку это объяснение было предложено в качестве психологии Ad hoc, то если оно хоть кому-то помогло, то пусть будет. Однако уважаемый автор решил, что стоит опереться на авторитет традиции - и привел следующую асмахту
Существует известная хасидская история, иллюстрирующая мысль, что порой человеку нужно прожить несколько лет на земле, чтобы доделать все, что осталось недоделанным в предыдущих воплощениях. Супружеская пара, у которой умер двухлетний сын, пришла к Исраэль Баалш-Шем Тову (Бешту), чтобы поделиться своим горем. Бешт сказал им, что у их сына была особенная душа, которая уже была в этом мире, которой нужно было вернуться на пару лет, чтобы окончательно очиститься от скверны. Когда очищение закончилось, душа вернулась к своему Истоку
Что это был за праведник, уважаемый автор не уточнил. Однако дал ссылку, по которой можно прочесть следующее:
Several hundred years ago lived a king who was childless. One of his advisors suggested that the reason the king was childless was because his Jewish subjects did not pray for him sincerely enough. The only way to make them do that, said this advisor, was to oppress them.
The next day the king issued a public proclamation stating that if the queen was not blessed with a child within in the next three months, all the Jews would be expelled from his kingdom. With all the neighboring countries closed to Jewish settlement, the poor Jews had nowhere to go. Their cries and prayers rose from every synagogue in the land.
A call resounded through the heavens for a soul willing to descend into the spiritually desolate environment of the royal palace in order the save the Jews of that land. Finally, one very holy soul agreed to make the sacrifice. Shortly thereafter, the queen became pregnant and soon gave birth to a son.
At the age of two, the child could already read and write, and when he was five years old he had surpassed all his teachers and learned all they had to teach. A master teacher -- a priest whose fame as a genius and scholar had spread far and wide -- was brought from afar to teach the prodigy. This new tutor was of a different caliber altogether. It seemed that he had mastered every form of wisdom in the world and his very presence radiated a thirst for knowledge. The young genius could not get enough of his new teacher. He became attached to him more than even to his own father the king. He spent every moment of the day and most of the night with him absorbing more and more wisdom and learning; and the more he absorbed the more he desired.
But the priest demanded his times of privacy. He had an agreement with the king that for two hours of every day he would lock himself in his room and no one, not even the King himself, was allowed to enter or disturb him in any way. It was on this condition that he accepted the task of teaching the prince.
But the prince was curious. He could not tolerate the idea that his beloved master was withholding something from him. He had to know everything!
One day, the young prince managed to hide himself in his teacher's room before the priest's daily two hours of seclusion. The priest entered the room, locked the door securely behind him, and searched the room thoroughly. Somehow he failed to discover the prince's hiding place and he proceeded in his strange daily ritual.
First he removed all the crosses from the walls and from around his neck, and put them in a box outside his window. Then he took out a large white woolen shawl with strings at the corners, wrapped it completely around his head and body, and began weeping like a baby.
Then he took out two small black boxes with long black straps attached to them, tied one to his left upper arm and the other above the middle of his forehead. After that he began to pray, swaying, singing and crying for over an hour. Finally, he took out a large Hebrew text and began reading from it in a sing-song voice, swaying back and forth all the time...
So the priest had no choice but to reveal that he was a Jew, doing was what Jews have been doing for thousands of years: praying and studying the Torah and fulfilling its commandments. He had been compelled to hide his faith during one of the many decrees of forced conversions that Jews were subjected to in those times; now he was forced to assume the guise of a alien religion on the pain of death.
"You must teach me your ancient wisdom!" the prince insisted...For several years they learned Torah together, until the boy announced that he wanted to convert to Judaism. His desire became so strong that teacher and pupil made up a story about going to Rome to further their studies and instead escaped to another country where the boy converted and never returned to the palace again.
"The prince became a great and famous sage," the Baal Shem Tov concluded his story, "living a life of saintliness and good deeds. When he passed on from this world and his soul ascended to the heavens, it was the most luminous soul that had returned from earth in many generations. Only one blemish dimmed its shinning perfection: the lingering effect of the fact that it had been conceived, borne, and fed for two years in the spiritually negative environment of the royal palace. All it lacked to attain the true heights of its glorious potential was for it to return to earth and be conceived, given birth to and weaned in the holy atmosphere of a righteous home.
Не будучи знатоком хасидской традиции, не возьмусь судить, кто придумал эту историю: сам Бешт, или те, кто позже придумывал о нем истории. Однако что касается исторической достоверности этой истории - тут, полагаю, двух мнений быть не может.
И так у нас все(с). :)