Reincarnation Personalities of History

HERE BEFORE

Kabbalists give many examples of gilgulim: Adam’s soul was passed on to King David, Chava’s to Batsheva, and the serpent to Uriah the Hittite.

Cain was reincarnated as Yisro, and Hevel as Moses. To atone for his role in the Egel Hazahav, Aaron’s soul was reborn as Eli the Priest. Job was from Terach, and Rus from Tamar.

For having prostrated before Eisav, Yaakov was sent back as Mordechai who obstinately refused to bow down to Haman. Judah’s wayward sons Er and Ohan were reborn as his righteous sons Peretz and Zarach.

Elijah was from Pinchas, and for having followed Jeroboam, Ahijah the Shilonite had to spend years hiding in a cave as R. Shimon bar Yochai.

The 24,000 disciples of R Akiva who died by plague were the same 24,000 who died in Zimri’s plague in the wilderness. The Chofetz Chaim stated that the idolatrous soldiers of Gideon ben Joash were reincarnated as the Cantonists of Tsarist Russia, where they were retested and found worthy.

Joseph’s 10 brothers were reincarnated as the 10 spies and then again as the 10 martyrs murdered by the Romans.

R Chaim Ibn Attar held he possessed the soul of King David. The Berditchever Rebbe said that he had been Rabbi Akiva in a previous life, and R Yisrael of Stolin that he had once been Rashi.

The Apter Rav could recall performing the priestly service in the Temple, and the Satmar Rebbe stated he had been a sheep in Yaakov’s flocks. Even the soul of Balaam was reincarnated into the donkey of R Pinchas ben Yair!

Not just Jewish biblical personalities claim to have undergone reincarnations throughout history, but even among non-Jews: Winston Churchill held that he was a reincarnation of the world’s first democrat, Pericles, and later as Alfred the Great, the founder of the English Nation.

General DeGaulle said that he had once been Cardinal Richelieu, saviour of France, and before that Joan of Arc.

Rommel and Montgomery thought they were reincarnates Hannibal and Scipio, who both refought their battles in the African Desert.

Shakespeare felt that he had been Aeschylus, Goethe as Leonardo da Vinci, and before that as Empedocles. Dante as Sophocles, Mozart as Michaelangelo, Hitler as Klingsor of Wartburg, Goebbels as Ecbert of Meran, and General Franco as King Felipe II.

Torah scholars maintain that the 10 Nazis hanged at Nuremberg in 1946 were the 10 hanged sons of Haman, and that Herman Goering had the soul of Haman’s wife.

Saddam Hussein proclaimed that he was Nebuchadnezzar, and today . . .

. . .some rabbis speculate that President Trump is the pro-Jewish Roman Emperor Antoninus, reincarnate!

The above was submitted by Amnon Goldberg, of Safed, to the Jerusalem Post Letters section of the weekend magazine edition 7/19/19

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Any errors or misspellings are mine as I retyped this from the paper.