What is rebirth? · पुनर्जन्म

Hindus believe that the self is not born with the body and does not die with it, but moves from life to life. What do the scriptures say about how, why and for how long?

The Bhagavad Gita gives the most famous image of rebirth: "As a person casts off worn-out clothes and puts on new ones, so the embodied self casts off worn-out bodies and enters new ones" (2.22). The cycle of birth, death and rebirth is called saṃsāra — "wandering".

If the body is left behind, what moves on? The Upanishads describe something subtler than the body — and a famous image of a caterpillar crossing from one blade of grass to another…

• The subtle body and the caterpillar
• Why rebirth happens
• Belief and evidence

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• Bhagavad Gita — 2.22, 8.6
• Brihadaranyaka Upanishad — 4.4.3–5
• Katha Upanishad