Always with great respect for God, the Supreme Creator and our Father, I focus on the origins and consequences of multiple events in human life, in its two substantial stages: the first, the spiritual, immortal; the second, material, with earthly existences (reincarnations). United, the two stages bring together the moral evolutionary level of each Spirit.

Weaving some reflections on such a lofty topic, never judging anyone, I highlight some gains and losses in those stages (spiritual and material). To this end, I position myself as a humble apprentice, trying to understand my possible understanding, initially, of the immortality of the Spirit and its stages, sometimes on the spiritual plane, sometimes enveloped in a physical organism.

Divine Law, or Natural Law, means that every human action, physical or unrealized, that is, only fixed in the mind and/or thought, inexorably attracts responsibility to the agent for what it may generate as a result. This is the lesson of Jesus when he warned us about sin in thought (Mark, 8:38), using adultery generically, not in the exclusive sense (marital infidelity), but in a more general sense, such as failing to do duty, distorting justice, etc.

Thus, in human terms, “determinism” and “fatality” are those words that, without being synonymous, are difficult to understand, as dictionaries — which should separate them — created a tenuous border between their meanings, almost making them similar.

Determinism:

Philosophically, it understands (...) “the relationship between phenomena by which they are linked in such a rigorous way that, at a given moment, every phenomenon is completely conditioned by those that precede and accompany it and conditions with the same rigor the that will occur next.”

(New Basic Dictionary of the Portuguese Language, p. 218 – FOLHA/AURÉLIO, 1994-1995, p.218. Ed. Nova Fronteira, S. Paulo/SP).

Generally speaking, determinism is the conception that all human events (including mental ones) are determined by causes. In other words: every event is explained by determination, that is, by causal relationships (cause and effect relationship).

Thus, in terms of determinism there is no chance: there is a chain of cause-effect between two or more phenomena, that is, natural phenomena and human facts are caused by their antecedents, which leads many to declare that “man is fruit of the environment.”

Human determinisms can be countless, just as human actions are countless, so I briefly cite just a few examples:

a. Natural determinism: expressions of the physical world: being born / breathing / eating / resting / dying;

b. Biological determinism: idea that all behavior, beliefs, and desires are fixed by our genetic endowment and constitution. They cannot be changed.

c. Environmental determinism (climatic or geographic): is the view that the physical environment determines culture, rather than social conditions.

d. Social determinism: the social environment in which an individual is born determines his life and actions, but it is not always possible to affirm the occurrence of safe causal relationships;

e. Scientific determinism: science, when determining the way of life of individuals, only recognizes what can be taken as truth and become the basis for choices and actions;

f. Theological determinism: belief that there is a God who determines everything that humans will do, either by knowing their actions in advance or through some omniscience.

Fatality:

According to Philosophy, fatality is “(...) attitude or doctrine that admits that the course of human life is previously fixed, with the will, or intelligence, being powerless to direct or alter it”. (New Basic Dictionary of the Portuguese Language – cited above, p.291).

Unexpected, unpredictable events with serious consequences characterize fatalities. When an unpredictable event occurs and there is no explanation, no answer, it is often said that it was a “fatal fate”. Below are some examples of fatalities:

a. Lightning strikes people, causing deaths and/or risk of death;

b. An accident, no fault of the driver, because the victim advanced carelessly, being hit by the vehicle that was traveling at legal speed;

c. Unexpected geological phenomena, with victims: earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, spontaneous fires; flagella; calamities; catastrophes and others.

There is also the so-called “fatalism”, a commonly highlighted doctrine, comprising several inexorable situations: inevitable destiny; unavoidable disastrous consequence of some event; deplorable coincidence; unfortunate chance; adversity, misfortune, and other adjectives.

It appears that the followers of fatalism passively abandon themselves to events: they archive intelligence and free will, two tools offered by God for use in any and all situations: they do not react / they do not create / they decide nothing / they resolve nothing — in the first place and ultimately, they accommodate themselves. (losses arise: time, the main one...).

Spiritist view of determinism and fatality

Spiritism always starts from the assumption that help from the Greater Plane is never absent for all those who, sincerely, in anguish or pain, pray and ask for support from the Father of Love. This stance, obviously, is not exclusive to spiritists, but rather to people with common sense and who have faith in God and all of his heavenly emissaries. In fact, even those who suffer — without prayers, without revolt, but with resignation — receive the balm of Divine Justice.

This is how Life contemplates everyone, with gains and support, never ignoring our adversities.

Determinism (according to some spiritual authors)

1. Spirit Emmanuel, in O Consolador, psychography by Francisco Cândido Xavier, 2nd Part, 6th Ed., 1976, FEB, RJ/RJ:

a. Question 121: The environment in which the soul was reborn often constitutes the expiatory test (we see here determinism as expiation);

b. Question 132: Determinism and free will coexist in life, intertwining on the road of destinies, for the elevation and redemption of men;

c. Question 133: Bodily expression prevails over human destinies (...), but in the intimate, zone of pure spiritual influence, man is free in the school of his future path;

d. Question 134: Aggravate or alleviate your determinism – Divine determination is a sacred universal law of good and happiness. The Spirit that works responsibly with other beings and educates itself gains natural rights and characterizes the good cooperator of the Supreme Father, who is God; (here, gains arise, through the practice of good);

e. Question 135: Divine determinism is constituted by a single law, which is that of love for the universal community. Failure to comply with this law results in rescues.

2. Spirit Alexandre, in “Missionaries of Light”, chap. 13, p. 227, 21st Ed., 1988, FEB, Brasília/DF:

- Reincarnation programs: map of useful tests, organized in advance, as an advance decision on the physical conditions and places most suitable for the evolution of the spirit to be reincarnated – (test or atonement).

3. Unknown author: regarding this article, I respectfully note the phrase inscribed on Allan Kardec's dolmen (tomb), in the Père-Lachaise Cemetery, in Paris: “Naître, mourir, renaître encore et progresser sans cease telle est la loi” (“To be born, to die, to be reborn again and to progress incessantly, such is the law”). (“Allan Kardec”, Zêus Wantuil and Francisco Thiesen, volume III, 2ndEd., p.140, 1978, FEB, Brasília/DF).

Fatality (also according to spiritual authors)

1) Without a doubt, there are natural and immutable laws that cannot be abrogated at the whim of each person; but, from believing that all circumstances of life are subject to fatality, it goes a long way. If this were so, man would be nothing more than a passive instrument, without free will and without initiative. (...) There are actions and certain requests from the individual that God grants, without breaking the harmony of universal laws. (Grifei) - (Allan Kardec, in The Gospel According to Spiritism, chapter XXVII, item 6).

This is how man himself creates present and future circumstances that change his life, excluding blind, “fatal” fate.

2) Fatality is an intelligently corrective effect of a cause of actions carried out by man, on Earth or in the afterlife. (Espírito Rosália, in “Memoirs Of A Suicide”, 2ªP., chap. V, p.318, 5ªEd., 1975, Rio).

3) There are reincarnations that function as drastic (...) God created free will, we created fatality” - (Mother Spirit of André Luiz, in “Our Home”, chapter 46, p.256, 48th Ed. , 1998, FEB, Rio).

4) Rescues: The significant amount of our past debts to be rescued is elaborated in programs that signify a kind of relative fatality, where our conduct can generate benefit or disfavor - (Clarêncio, in “Entre a Terra e o Céu”, chapter II, p.14, 13thEd., 1990, FEB, Rio).

5) Fatality according to The Spirits’ Book:

- Q. 853: Fatal, only the moment of death;

- Q. 855: Dangers are warnings (from the Guardian Angel)

- Q. 859: Fatality truly only exists in relation to the moment in which you must appear and disappear from this world

(As for spiritual predictions — premonitory dreams, for example —, they are also warnings and not certainty of fatal events)

- Q. 261 and 865: Luck in gambling: winning as a man and losing as a Spirit.

This is a kind of joy previously chosen (test), being granted to him as a temptation (without chance...), that is, a test of his pride and cupidity.

Conclusion

Divine Laws hover over all of us, based on the Law of Love, sacred and unique! Dealing with the evils of this life, without previous actions justifying them, many philosophers disbelieved or still disbelieve in Divine Justice, since according to what is preached by most religions, God is just — invariably just —, so much so that It is popularly said that: “God never puts a cross on the wrong shoulder”.

Such philosophers support their disbelief at the sight of so many earthly misfortunes: individual or collective “fatalities”, like inevitable accidents, loss of loved ones, reverses of fortune, victimization resulting from natural scourges, birth illnesses, condemnation of innocent people, “stray bullets” etc.

According to Spiritism, if a sad event reaches someone, without any predictability or cause, considering the perfectibility of Divine Justice, the origin of this event can only be in one place: in the past, in another earthly existence, that is, in another reincarnation of that unfortunate person.

Kardec recorded about this logical thought: However, by virtue of the axiom according to which every effect has a cause, such miseries are effects that must have a cause and, as long as a just God is admitted, this cause must also be just. Now, since the effect always precedes the cause, if the cause is not present in the current life, it must be prior to that life, that is, it must be in a previous existence. In The Gospel According to Spiritism, chap. V, item 6.

The blessing of successive lives (reincarnation) illuminates any philosophical doubts about these “fatalities”, inferring that all these events are consequences (effects), whose antecedents (causes) are in the past. Otherwise, in fact, perfect Divine Justice would not be admitted!

There is no greater philosophical evidence of successive lives!

It remains as a reflection, unshakable, unquestionable and definitive faith and truth, that “in the sea of life no living being is a boat without direction or compass”, so the notable events of their existence are indeed, under “administration of the Greater Plane”, wise and just.