Buzz
What would your reaction be if your four-year-old suddenly began recalling a past life? You might dismiss it as fantasy, or you might take it seriously and seek out expert advice. Perhaps you’d even reach out to the researchers at the University of Virginia’s Division of Perceptual Studies.
The Division’s extensive collection of over 1,200 case files includes stories about children who claimed to be stunt performers, children born with birthmarks corresponding to fatal wounds from previous lives, and many other remarkable cases. While some researchers believe in reincarnation, others argue that these accounts are more likely the result of false memories, exaggerations, suggestibility, or a desire for attention.
Now, take a moment to reflect on these cases involving children who believe they have been reincarnated from earlier lives.
10. Suleyman Andary
Suleyman Andray, born in Lebanon in 1954, remembered a past life. As a child, he even recalled the names of some of his children from this previous existence. It’s important to note that Andray came from a Druse family. The Druse community follows a faith rooted in Islam and embraces the belief in reincarnation.
Andray also vividly remembered his origins from the village of Gharife, where he had owned an olive oil press. At the age of five or six, his family would hear him muttering names while he slept. He later claimed these were the names of his children in his past life. At eleven, Andray refused to lend a book, recalling that he had a rule against it in his former life. He also recalled the name Abdallah from his previous existence.
Over time, Andray stopped discussing his memories due to teasing from others. In 1967, he visited Gharife. Locals confirmed that a man named Abdallah Abu Hamdan had indeed owned an olive press in the village and had lived there. Andray also recognized familiar landmarks during his visit.
9. Tae
Professor Ohkado Masayuki, a renowned Japanese linguistics scholar, specializes in researching childhood reincarnation cases. One of his most notable cases is an interview he conducted in 2015.
The past life in question belonged to a woman with three children, including a cherished daughter. Tragically, the woman passed away in 1993. The following year, the daughter married, moved away, and had Tae in 1996. Tae reminded Atsuko of her late mother. When Atsuko showed a picture of Midori to two-year-old Tae, saying, “This is your grandmother,” the child replied, “Me.” Much like the Andary case, Atsuko's family followed Zen, a religion that believes in reincarnation.
When Tae was three, Atsuko went through a period of depression due to her mother's death. During a walk with Tae, Atsuko heard the child say, “I have to cheer her up.” Atsuko felt as though her mother had returned. However, when Masayuki re-interviewed Tae in her late teens, she no longer remembered Midori or her past life.
8. James Leninger
At the age of two, in 2001, James Leninger began making statements about a past life as an American World War II pilot. His memories emerged after a visit to the Cavanaugh Flight Museum with his father. Soon after, James started having recurring nightmares about a plane fire. He later recalled flying his plane off a boat named Natoma in his previous life and even identified his former self as Jack Larsen. While looking through a book on Iwo Jima, James identified the spot where Larsen’s plane had been shot down.
Leninger’s case has faced skepticism in recent years. Critics have questioned the case’s validity, arguing that it lacks concrete evidence or convincing explanations. Furthermore, they claim that it is mostly James’s parents who provide the details of the story.
7. Dorothy Eady
Born in 1904 in the Blackheath area of London, Dorothy Eady suffered a severe fall at three years old. While visiting the British Museum with her family, Eady saw a photograph of Pharaoh Seti I of Egypt. She immediately claimed that the location in the photograph was her home and began walking around the museum, kissing the feet of Egyptian statues.
At fifteen, Eady had a vivid dream in which she encountered the mummy of Pharaoh Seti I. She believed the Pharaoh helped her recall her previous life. Her peculiar behaviors, such as sleepwalking, led to her being admitted to a sanitarium several times. Eady eventually adopted the name Omm Sety and became a renowned Egyptologist.
6. YTK
In the late 1960s, a man known as MMS lived with his wife at an air force base. In 1968, MMS participated in a parachute training exercise, where he was dropped from a plane. Sadly, he landed too close to the edge of the airfield and fell into a 15-foot-deep (4.5-meter) pond, which led to his death. Several years after MMS’s passing, his widow remarried one of his fellow airmen. She later gave birth to a son, YTK, who had both birth defects and distinctive rope-like birthmarks around his leg.
By the age of three, YTK began talking about falling from the sky, getting entangled in ropes, and dying. By the time he turned five, he stopped discussing these memories altogether. Throughout his childhood, YTK lived at the same base where the parachuting exercises had occurred and slept in a cot suspended from the ceiling with parachute ropes. His mother confirmed that YTK had no knowledge of his father’s death.
5. Shiva Tripathi
Sumitra Singh lived with her husband in Uttar Pradesh, India. In 1985, Singh experienced a series of episodes where she lost consciousness, her eyes rolled, and her teeth clenched. During some of these episodes, she spoke, and once she even predicted she would die in three days. Remarkably, three days later, she appeared to pass away.
After a period of disorientation, Singh began acting in a noticeably different manner. She failed to recognize those around her and began referring to herself as Shiva. She also claimed that she had been murdered by her in-laws in Dibiyapur, India, and rejected her own children. Singh later described numerous details that matched the life of a woman who had been violently killed in 1985. Singh eventually traveled to Sharifpura, where a man identified her as his daughter. During this time, she also began reading and writing, despite having had little formal education. Details of her case were published in 1985 by The Indian Express.
4. Manisha
In 2005, a four-year-old girl named Manisha entered a family home in South Delhi, India, and declared that she was the couple’s daughter, Suman, who had tragically passed away at the age of 15 due to typhoid in 2000. The little girl eventually moved in with the couple she identified as her ‘new’ parents.
The child was born to a couple near Rajasthan, India. At just two years old, the girl announced to her parents that she had been reincarnated. Later, she revealed to her biological parents the details of her previous life and even the names of her ‘new’ parents.
3. Bishen Chand
Bishen Chand, born in Northern India in 1912, was given the name Visha Natha by his mother, who had visited the Vishwanath temple before conceiving him. At only ten months old, Chand overheard his family discussing Pilibhit, a larger town located 31 miles (50 kilometers) to the northeast. As he grew, the child began to mention Pilibhit and other specific details about his past life, even identifying his previous name as Laxmi Narain. When he was four, Chand was taken to a town beyond Pilibhit. Upon hearing the name Pilibhit during the return journey, he insisted on getting off the train, though his request was denied.
When Chand finally visited Pilibhit, he immediately recognized several locations and continued to make statements about his previous life. Notably, the child also learned to play a type of drum he had never encountered before. As he matured, Chand’s memories of his past life began to fade. In 1969, after numerous interviews with Chand’s family, reincarnation researcher Ian Stevenson interviewed a 40-year-old Chand, who commented that his past life had been more favorable, as it involved more wealth and greater freedom.
2. Luke Ruehlman
In 2017, a two-year-old boy named Luke Ruehlman began expressing concerns about his safety at his family’s home in Cincinnati. The child also started referring to a ladybug as ‘Pam,’ despite his family not knowing anyone named Pam. Soon after, Luke began calling various objects, from toys to drawings, by the name Pam. He also claimed that in his past life, he had been a girl with black hair and used to wear earrings.
When his family inquired about who Pam was, Luke responded that it had been his name in a previous life. He went on to describe that Pam had died, ascended to heaven, met God, and was then sent back to Earth as Luke. Interestingly, Luke’s family was not religious and had never discussed religious matters in front of him. The boy later mentioned that he had perished in a fire after jumping from a building in Chicago. At the time, Luke didn’t even know where Chicago was. Luke’s mother later researched the Paxton Hotel in Chicago, a building that primarily housed African Americans. In 1993, a devastating fire at the hotel trapped many residents on the upper floors.
1. Cameron Macauley
Cameron Macauley was born in 2000 in Glasgow, Scotland. At the age of two, Macauley began speaking about a previous life on the remote island of Barra, located in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides. Soon, he started insisting that he needed to go to Barra to reunite with his ‘other family,’ providing various details about them, including the family’s surname. Macauley also claimed that his previous father had been killed by a car accident.
At the age of five, Macauley visited Barra and was able to find the Robertson family home. Once inside, the child became overcome with emotion and expressed a deep sadness, telling his mother that he missed his previous mother.
