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"Put at the beginning of the book the vine-branch we have drawn for that purpose, because it is the emblem of the work of the Creator. In it are united all the material elements that most fitly symbolize body and spirit: the stem represents the body; the juice, the spirit; the fruit, the union of body and spirit. Man’s labour calls forth the latent qualities of the juice; the labour of the body develops, through the knowledge thus acquired, the latent power of the soul."

that was said to Allan Kardec by the Superior Spirits who assisted him for writing The Book of the Spirits.

What is the Spiritism

Presentation:

Even among people who call themselves Spiritists, just a few of them really knows about the Spiritism. The biggest part of them rather has heard about that from others than really read and researched information from security sources. And when it concerns to the Spiritism Doctrine, the most secure and trustful sources are the Allan Kardec literature.

Perhaps for many of those who will try it, the reading of Kardec, by the beginning, may be of difficult understanding. That is the reason why we will try to present below, through a simple language, the summary of this doctrine in order to help whoever wants to learn about it. However, despite of the orientation you will find here, it is strongly recommended that you read the basic books of Allan Kardec, which are: The Book of the Spirits, The Book of the Mediums and The Gospel According to the Spiritism. They are also available here for free downloading.

Why is it important to know about the Spiritism?

Most of people living the busy life of current days are not interested in the fundamental problems of the Existence. First of all they think that questions about "God existence" and "immortality of the soul" are only duties of priests, religion ministers, philosophers or theologians. When everything is doing fine in their lives, they do not even think about God and, when they do, it is just to make a prayer, or to go to church or other acts that are ordinary obligations they have to comply anyway. The religion for them is just a simple social formality, something that people can have and nothing more. In the best case, it is a "peace of mind" to make themselves to feel good before God. This is so evident that many people don’t even have a firm belief in the words they preach, bringing along serious doubts about God and the life continuation after death.

However, when such people are surrendered for a serious personal issue, a strong financial break, the loss of a dear being, an incurable disease, which are facts that soon of later happen to everyone, they do not find inside themselves the faith needed, neither the understanding required to face the problem with courage and resignation, and then they fall down into desperation.

The Spiritism knowledge open us a broad and rational vision of the life, explaining it buy an irrefutable and convincing manner and allowing us to start a deep transformation, moving us closer to God.

What is the Spiritism about?

The Spiritism can answer the fundamental questions of life, such as:

Those questions and many others can be answered by the Spiritism, because such are the questions we make to ourselves in face of so many injustices, inequality and different fates in the complex life of our planet…

What is the Spiritism?

The Spiritism is a doctrine disclosed by the Superior Spirits, through their communications with mediums, and organized (codified) by a French educator, Hipolyte León Denizard Rivail (Allan Kardec), in 1857. So, it appeared in France since more than a century ago.

Is the Spiritism a Science?

Yes, because it studies, under the light of the reason and purely scientific criteria, the medium phenomena, meaning the phenomena caused by the spirits, which in fact are natural events.

There is no "supernatural" in the Spiritism. All phenomena, even the mostly stranger ones, have a scientific explanation. They are thus of natural order.

The Scientific character of the Spiritism is covered in The Book of The Mediums, by Allan Kardec.

Is the Spiritism a Philosophy?

Yes, since supported by the Spiritist phenomena, it gives us a meaning and an interpretation for the life, answering questions such as "where do I come from?", "what do I do in this world?", "where am I going to be after death?", etc.. Every kind of doctrine which gives us an interpretation, a meaning, for the life, a proper conception of the world, can be considered as a philosophy.

The Philosophic character of the Spiritism is approached in The Spirit's Book, by Allan Kardec.

Is the Spiritism a Religion?

Yes, we also say the Spiritism is a religion, because it has as main target the moral transformation of mankind, taking the Jesus' teachings for being put into practice on everyone's daily life. It revives the Christianity into its real expression of love and charity.

The Religious character of the Spiritism is approached in The Gospel According to The Spiritism, by Allan Kardec.

The Sense of the Spiritism Religion

The Spiritism is not a kind of religion organized through a clerical structure. In this case, it is completely different from traditional religions. In the Spiritism there is no priests, no religious heads, no sumptuous temples; it does not adopt any kind of ceremonies as baptism, weddings, etc... there are no rituals, no candles, no special clothes, neither any kind of symbols. It does not use ornaments for cults, nor reverence gestures, nor talisman, nor smokes, no ceremony songs, no drinks, no offers, etc…

The Spiritism cult is performed deeply from the heart. It is the cult of pure feelings, the cult of the love for the neighbor, of the constant work in favor of the mankind. Only the pure thoughts in the good can connect us to God and only the goodwill actions make us His truly followers. Thus, the Spiritism tries to revive Jesus' teachings, by its deep simplicity and sincerity, without luxury, without social conventions, without pomps, without wealthy, because God must be adored through our soul and true, as recommended by Jesus.

The Spiritism is the Consoler (Comforter) promised by Jesus, as in John, 14 15-17 & 26:

"If you love me keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father and He shall give you another Comforter, who will be with you forever - the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, it neither sees him nor knows him; But you shall know him, for he lives with you and shall be in you. ...But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things and remind you of everything I have said to you"

 

Basic Principles of the Spiritism

a.) God Existence

God exists. It is the origin and the end of everything. It is the Creator, first cause of everything.

God is the supreme perfection, with all attributes that our mind can imagine, and much more. We cannot know its nature, its scent, because of the imperfect stage of evolution we all still are in the Earth. How could a limited and imperfect intelligence like ours to understand the unlimited and perfect knowledge, which is God?

 

b.) Immortality of the Soul

Before we were human beings, sons of our parents, we are indeed Spirits, sons of God. The spirit is the Intelligent Principle of the Universe, created by God, simple and ignorant, to evolve and reach the perfection by its own efforts.

As spirits, we existed even before we were born and we will continue to exist even after our bodies’ death. When a spirit is living a corporal, physical life, we say it is a Soul or an Incarnated Spirit. When the spirit comes to the world in a baby body we say it has reincarnated; and when the spirit leave this body (when it "dies") we say it has discarnated. When it happens, the Spirit comes back to the Spiritual Sphere or Spirituality, where it belongs to. Spirits are thus "discarnated people", who are in the present days living in the Spirituality.

 

c.) The Reincarnation

Created simple and ignorant, the Spirit is who decides and creates its own destiny. In order to do that, it has the FREE-WILL, which is its capacity of choosing between good and evil. So the Spirit has the possibility of development, evolving, perfecting, and turning itself into a better been, more perfect, as a pupil in the school, passing through the several grades and courses. This evolution requires learning, and the Spirit can only reach this learning by incarnating and discarnating over the world, as many times as necessary in order to get more knowledge, through the multiple life experiences.

The progress acquired by the Spirit, through its living experiences during its uncounted existences, is not only intellectual, but mainly a moral progress. This is what will take it even closer to God. 

But, in the same way like a pupil can repeat a school grade, once, twice or even more times, the Spirit that do not take a good advantage of its existence in the Earth, can remain stationary for a long time, facing further suffering and delaying thus its evolution.

We cannot know how many incarnations we’ve had so far, nor even how many we still have ahead. However we know that, as less evolved spirits, we will still have many and many incarnations until we reach the moral development needed in order to become pure spirits.

However, not all the incarnations are done over the Earth. There are other worlds with more or less evolution than ours. Once we evolve much, we can reborn in a higher order planet. The Universe is infinite and “in my Father’s house there are many mansions”, as said by Jesus. Earth is a world of inferior moral category, as verified in the lamentable situation where the humanity is encountered. However, this planet is subject to become into a sphere of regeneration, where men decide to make the good, and the fraternity reigns among them. 

 

d.) The Forget of the Past

We do not remember our past lives, and this is due the great wisdom of God. If we could remember of the evil we made or the suffering we passed, the enemies who caused us harm or those whom we caused them harm, then we would have no condition to live among them in the present days. Even because, much often, the enemies of the past are today our sons, brothers, parents, friends, people who are now together with us for the opportunity of reconciliation. That is why there are reincarnations.

Certainly today we are correcting our failings committed against someone, we are suffering the consequences of old crimes, or even we are being supported, assisted for those who caused us harm in the past. So the importance of the family, where the broken links of old existences can be connected again.

The reincarnation is so an opportunity of repairing, as well as an opportunity to devote our efforts toward the good of the others, hastening our spiritual evolution. When we reincarnate, we bring a “plan of life”, which are consisted by commitments assumed before the spirituality and before ourselves. Such commitments refer to the repair of the evil we may have done, and to the practice of all possible good we can do. Depending on our spiritual condition we could or not have chosen the proofs, the suffering, the difficulties that will test our spiritual development.

The reincarnation therefore understood as a perfect mechanism of the Divine Justice, can explain us why there are such many inequality of destinies for the creatures on the Earth.

The finality of life on Earth is so:

1)     To expiate the evil we did, paying with suffering for our errors;

2)     To proof or measure our grade of evolution, before the difficulties of the life;

3)     To help the humanity and explain the good before the others;

4)     To develop special missions, in case of evolved spirits who render great services to the humanity.

By the mechanism of the reincarnation we can verity that God does not punish. We are the causers of our own suffering, by the law of “Action and Reaction”.

 

e.) The Spirits communication

Spirits are discarnated human beings. When discarnated they remain being what they were when alive: good or bad, serious or joker, laborious or lazy, refined or ordinary, true or liars.

They are everywhere and they are not idle. Actually, they have their occupation, like we incarnated have ours.

There is not a determinate place for the Spirits. Generally the most imperfect ones are closer to us, due our imperfections. We don’t see them, because they are in a different dimension. But they can see us and even know some of our thoughts.

Spirits act on us. But this action is almost totally restricted to our thoughts, because they cannot act directly on the material. For that, they need people who can offer them special resources: these people are those called MEDIUMS.

Through the medium the discarnated Spirit can communicate, whether it wants and whether it can. This communication depends on the type of mediumship or faculty grade of the medium. Mediumship can be through the speech (psychophony), or through the writing (psychography), etc…But not any communication can be blindly accepted. It must be carefully analyzed, treated with the proper judgment, or we can be victims of deceiver Spirits. The communication depends on the moral conduct of the medium. If he is an idoneous person, with good moral principles, then he is able to receive the communication from good Spirits. Chico Xavier, for instance, was a great medium, due his high moral qualities. 

The Spiritism Doctrine alerts those more credulous people against the mystification and against the fake mediums, who try to delude the less informed public in exchange of material advantages. This is why it is very important that, before listening to a communication, the person is clarified about the Spiritism.

 

f.) The reasoned faith

To believe in truth, first of all, we need to understand that thing we want to believe. A creed without reasoning is nothing but a blind belief, a superstition. Before we take something as truth, we should analyze it carefully. Something bad in many people is their belief in everything what is told them, without a deep examination.

According to Allan Kardec, in the Gospel According to Spiritism: “Unshakable faith is only that which can meet the reason face to face in every humanity epoch.”

 

g.) The evolution law

Each one of us is an incarnated Spirit moving toward God. Life in Earth is always a readjustment opportunity toward the good. The choice made is up to us. Then, its good or bad consequences are the results of our own decisions. It is the Law of Action and Reaction, the Law of Cause and Effect. If we are suffering now we conclude that the cause for this suffering comes from errors we made in the past. Therefore, if we cause the evil, soon or late we will suffer its consequences. “To each one according to its works”, said Jesus. This explains the reason of so many suffering in the world. Because of that, ones walk faster than others, as the different pupils advance in a classroom. As better our conduct, faster will be our release from suffering, making shorter our path of evolution.

There is no heaven or hell, as usually preached by the traditional religions. There are indeed states of soul that can be described as celestial or hellish. Also there are no angels or demons, but just superior or inferior Spirits, that are also moving toward perfection – the good ones becoming better and the bad ones into regeneration. God doesn’t want none of Its sons to get lost; and the God’s will is the Law.

If the fate of a human being was unappealably sentenced after its death, so everyone would be lost, since we have been more evil than good people. And also almost nobody in our days should deserve to go to the haven of blessings, where only the pure ones should live.

For the other hand, a simple life, as longer as it could take, it is not long enough to clarify us about the plans of God. Many have not even means to guarantee their own survival and even less ones the opportunity of a good education. Many never were oriented for the good. Others die too young, before even being oriented about the better path to go.

In order to measure how absurd is the idea of heaven and hell, as eternal penalties, we only need to try to answer the following questions: Being God the Supreme wisdom, including knowing our future, how could It to create a son, knowing he would go down to the hell for all the eternity? Which God would be this? Where are Its goodness and mercy? And how could a lover mother to rest in peace in heaven, knowing that her loved son is burning in the hell’s fire? 

 

h.) The moral law

Therefore, nobody is lost. Each one has the opportunity it deserves. If a human father, who is bad and imperfect, is not able to apply a eternal sentence to his son, the worse this son could be, then even less will do it God, who is Merciful and Perfect Father, who makes it rain over the evil and the good ones, who allows the sun light to illuminate the right and the unjust ones indistinctly.

Christ said: “Except a man reborn again he cannot see the kingdom of heaven”. With these words he referred to the birth of the body and to the moral rebirth of each one, meaning to reborn in water and in Spirit. Therefore we know that life is always a new opportunity of reconciliation with the higher ideals of the good and the truth.

To follow the live example of Jesus must be the target of any sincere Christian. It is not only enough to say that you belong to this or that religion. It doesn’t matter if you keep praying all the time. The important is the practice, is the life of every day, because as said by the Apostle James: “The faith without work is dead faith”.

 

And by talking about faith, please check out how is your life:

- How have you been treating your family: your father, your mother, your brothers, you husband or wife, your kids, or even the strange people? How is your conduct in your work, in the school, in the club, in the public sites, with the ones that coexist with you? How do you react before an offense, an aggression, a calumny, an ungratefulness? How do you react before a family problem, a loss of a dear being, an incurable illness? And what are you doing in favor of others?

 

“LOVE EACH OTHER”, SAID JESUS.

And there is no other way to love, except being charitable. Charity means to be benevolent, patient, tolerant, and humble. It is to do to others what we would have them to do to us. As we don’t have the others to do us evil, but all the good as possible, thus we also should not cause the evil to them, or to their families, relatives, friends, strangers, or even enemies. The Christian obligation is to be a worker of the good, giving it the best, the little it could be, in the fight for a better world.

We can do it all, taking better care of our attitudes, watching to our behavior, being more exigent with ourselves.

 

 

Books of Allan Kardec:

-          The Spirits’ Book (1857)

-          The Mediums’ Book (1861)

-          The Gospel According to Spiritism (1864)

-          Haven and Hell (1865)

-          Genesis (1868)

 

 

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