What Determines Where We Are Born, To Whom, And Under What Circumstances?

By Angoo Ba

One thing about the world that he often wondered about was what determined where a person would be born, to which set of parents and in what sort of circumstances. For instance:

· Why was it that some people were born in a prosperous, well-developed part of the world while many others were born in places in the world that were wracked by poverty, disease and hunger?

· Why were some people born in a country that was peaceful and well-governed while others were born in a country that was torn by strife and war?

· Why was it that someone was born into a very affluent and influential family, while someone else was born to a family of paupers?

· Why was someone born in a family that professed a particular religion and identified with a particular ethnic group?

· Why was it that someone was born to parents who were very loving and kind, while someone else was born to parents who were negligent, cruel and mean?

· Why did someone get parents who were very devout, while others’ parents were hardened atheists?

· Why did some people inherit good looks, while others did not?

· Why were some children born physically deformed or mentally retarded, while others were born physically healthy?

Where one was born, to whom and under what circumstances had a tremendous influence on one’s life chances. They shaped the course of one’s life in a very major way. Given this, was there any logic at all behind how these factors operated in a person’s birth, he would wonder. He hoped that this did not happen arbitrarily, because that would make the world seem astoundingly absurd and unfair. He really wished there was some acceptable explanation to his many why questions.

After careful reflection, he concluded that there could be only three possible answers to these questions:

According to one of these, which reflected an atheistic perspective, where, to whom and under what circumstances a person was born were all a matter of chance or accident, being completely random.

The other two explanations reflected a religious/spiritual perspective. According to one of these explanations, where, to whom and under what circumstances one was born were determined entirely by God. God, in His wisdom, decided these things, according to His plan for the world (which included His plan for each one of us). Why, on what basis, God did so was a complete mystery to human beings, which, at least for as long as we remained alive on this planet, it was impossible for us to understand or fathom.

According to the second of these two religious/spiritual perspectives, where, to whom and under what circumstances people were born were the cumulative result of actions, good and bad, that they had committed in innumerable previous lifetimes. Their stock of actions from these earlier lifetimes determined the particular part of the world they would be born in in their present lifetime, who their parents would be, the social group they would be born into, their looks, and so on.

These, then, were the only possible explanations that he could think of that could possibly answer the why questions that he would often wonder about. He could not conceive of any other explanation.

All of these three explanations seemed equally plausible to him. Obviously, however, only one of them could be correct. Much though he wished he knew which of them was the right one, there was no way (other than on the basis of belief) for him to know the answer with certainty. Perhaps he would come to know the truth of the matter only after he died, when he met God, he said to himself. Till then, he had to remain content with not knowing what was, at least for the time being, unknowable.