Unified Terran Community

Some further musings on the subject of reincarnation. As has been mentioned elsewhere, the process of reincarnation is one of the most important underlying concepts of the Unified Terran Community setting. When I was researching the subject, to help me decide how I wanted it to work in the alternate reality of the stories. I was surprised at the prevalence of the idea in real world religions, both contemporary and ancient. It’s important to point out that my research was not exhaustive, I wasn’t particularly keen to imitate a specific religions interpretation of reincarnation, I was more interested to see a few different examples. From what I was able to gather there are, broadly speaking, two versions of the concept. In one paradigm, it is the rebirth of a human soul into another human body. In the second paradigm, the process of reincarnation is not restricted to incarnation into human form, souls can be reborn in animal bodies. Within these two very broad categories, there are numerous subtle variations which combine to ensure that there is no consensus view on exactly how the process works. The lack of consensus wasn’t surprising but was quite handy from the point of view of seeing different takes on the subject. I also didn’t want to endorse any one religions interpretation of the subject. You can’t please everyone, with such disparate views on the concept, so I opted not to please anyone. Generally speaking, though, I followed the idea of reincarnation being restricted to human to human transfer.

The Mystery Religions of Ancient Greece were the inspiration for the terminology that the members of the Community use to describe their incarnation technology. Areas such as India and the Orient are of course famous for the incorporation of reincarnation into their beliefs, but it was, and is, present in some form in every culture. The ancient religion of the Egyptians, which seems to be the ancestor of many other belief systems, had a strong emphasis on reincarnation. J.J. Dewey postulates that the belief was part of early Christian teachings, but was removed as church leaders felt it was incompatible with their doctrines.The Church of Scientology also features reincarnation as a central belief, although their take on it has human kind as being extra terrestrial in origin (or at least that’s my understanding of it…)

A process related to the concept of reincarnation is past life regression, by means of hypnosis. One of the most recurring features associated with this, is the considerable historical inaccuracy associated with the memories. This has led many to the conclusion that the memories recovered through the hypnotic technique are not true memories, but creations of the subconscious after receiving a suggestion to recall memories from before the subjects birth. This got me thinking as well, what if it were possible to prove such memories were real? This would be a fundamental change to our reality and how we perceive each other. Then I began to consider the possibilities of the complete restoration of the memories from any past incarnation. The vast increase of collective wisdom, would have a staggering impact on our society, techniques and theories from the ancient world which we have never been able to duplicate or fully grasp would become accessible once more. Marry this with our modern day technological advances and vast cultural leaps could be made.

Which leads me conveniently to a small advance notice, the third part of the main UTC story arc, with a working title of ‘The High Watchtower’ is underway and will be posted in due course. I’m also working on another Travellers Tales instalment, which should be finished around the same time or possibly a bit earlier. For those who simply can’t wait, there will be a background article very soon which will have a few clues as to the next story. I’ll bid you farewell, for now, and hope to see you again soon!

unifiedterrancommunity@gmail.com

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Although the Unified Terran Community has no single leader, as such, they were initially guided by the vision of a cabal of scientists, philosophers and philanthropists. Pre-eminent among them was the man known as Heru Seleem. The precise origins of the man are shrouded in mythology, it seems, however, that Heru Seleem was the first human to retain full memory of his previous incarnations every time he was reborn. Heru was believed to have been born in Egypt near the end of the period referred to, by twenty first century scholars, as the Early Dynastic Period. It is thought that Seleem was a member of the Egyptian priesthood on several incarnations, as well as living diverse other lives serving as advisor to several Pharaohs, as well as developing numerous agricultural and alchemical techniques over several lifetimes. Many of the advances in agriculture which made food readily available Egypt were methods pioneered by Seleem. For Seleem himself, his most useful discovery was an alchemical recipe, ancient even then, which taught him the skills required to create living, but soulless simulacra. He used these vessels to reincarnate himself into an adult form, so that he could continue whatever work was consuming him at that time.

As the centuries rolled past, Seleem wandered the planet, exploring the rise and fall of a multitude of civilisations. As Seleem travelled, he began to see a pattern emerging from the history of ages. He began to take note of what aspects of a culture caused its initial growth and prosperity as well as taking note of the characteristics of cultural degeneration. He slowly began to conceive of a society where mankind could truly prosper. The main obstacle to overcome was the implementation of this massive cultural change. Seleem swiftly realised he would require considerable time and help to realise his plan and began to seek out certain individuals who he felt would see the value of his scheme. As preparations slowly built, Seleem was saddened and frustrated by the loss of his comrades to the inevitability that was death, and subsequent loss of memory upon reincarnation. Seleem understood the cause of the phenomena, and began to dream of a method of crossing the Lethean Barrier, while retaining recollection of past events. Employing principles conceived of by Pythagoras, Seleem began to work on the prototype of the Mnemosyne Device during the sixteenth century, aided in his work by Dr John Dee, advisor to the English Queen, Elizabeth I. During this period, Seleem also had frequent contact with Francis Bacon, whose ideas, he strongly influenced. When the first Mnemosyne Device was finally constructed in the seventeenth century, Dr Dee was the first soul to employ it as a means of incarnating into a simulacrum. Seleem carefully hid the Device from world at large, and began to approach the people who eventually become the founders of the Unified Terran Community.

Meanwhile, the endemic violence of the human race continued. Despite not actively fighting, Seleem was killed sixty three times during the Second World War. By this time, Seleem had seen thousands of years of conflict and strife between the nations of man and had concluded that a truly fundamental change had to occur. Seleem gathered his technologist allies and, in the dark days of the early twenty first century, they made their move. It took the rest of that incarnation for Seleem and his allies to stabilize the Community. As he approached the end of his incarnation, Seleem announced that he would not return immediately, but instead planned to explore the spirit world and return once he had learned the ‘wisdom of the distant shadows’. That was a little over two hundred years ago, and no one has seen or heard from Heru Seleem since.

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