Bottom line is there simply is no direct teaching of reincarnation in the bible. It was rejected very strongly by our Church Fathers and through out Christianity. Are we to believe that some how God would leave out such a important "missing link"?
There have been brighter minds then us who have pondered these questions and there is no scholar that would claim there is evidence to support this view.
QFT.
What does it mean figuratively? That this Elijah will be the one to prepare the way for the Messiah. John the Baptist did so, and he denied being Elijah. I'm sure you will agree that he would not have lied about this, being a holy man of God, and possibly in His presence in the intervening years, where no evil can subsist. What does a figurative meaning mean here? Just that John the Baptist fulfilled the role of Elijah in the prophecy. He was not literally Elijah returned to earth--you act as if Christ never said anything that wasn't immediately apparent. The fact is, if John the Baptist wasn't literally Elijah, the prophecy is no less true. "In the spirit and power of Elijah" does not mean "with the soul of Elijah" or any other silly construction, or it need not mean such when there are other interpretations available that oppose 1,978 years of Christian history. If you want me to spell it out with some of the verses you supplied, I will.
[BIBLE]
And the disciples asked him, saying, "Why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?"
But he answered them and said, "Elijah indeed is to come and will restore all things. But I say to you that Elijah has come already, and they did not know him, but did to him whatever they wished. So also shall the Son of Man suffer at their hand."
Then the disciples understood that he had spoken of John the Baptist." (Matt. 17:10-13)
[/BIBLE]
You said "there's no way this could be meant figuratively." My rebuttal: Yes there is.
John the Baptist had a mission much the same as Elijah's, just as you said. Christ's saying that he was Elijah does not need to mean that he was literally that prophet reincarnated, in just the same way that the prophecy about Jesus reigning from the throne of David forever does not need to mean that He came to re-establish the independent Israel as a nation-state and rule over it from Jerusalem. That was what was expected from reading the OT prophecies (just like the Jews expected Elijah to return again to earth) without the understanding that it's not always the most obvious meaning through which the prophecy was fulfilled. Elijah himself didn't need to come back, and if he had, it would have been as Elijah, not as another person. The role ascribed to Elijah in the prophecies was fulfilled by John the Baptist, not because he was the soul of Elijah returned to Earth, but because he was created especially for this purpose of preparing the way of the Lord.
[
BIBLE]For all the prophets and the law have prophesied until John. And if you are willing to receive it, he is Elijah who was to come.[/BIBLE]
Does not mention reincarnation at all on the surface. John the Baptist denied being Elijah, and Christ did not "clearly say" he really was. Yes, saying "reincarnation" does make a lot of phrases and difficulties in Scripture seem to be related, but that's a very bad method. Perhaps you would also deny the Trinity because "I and the Father are one."
Does reincarnation even make sense of things that didn't make sense already? Not according to what I've shown there (apply it yourself to the other mentions of John the Baptist that I didn't discuss, because it'll be the same thing I say for those). Indeed, what about the problems it raises for these verses?
[BIBLE]
Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.[/BIBLE] Heb. 9:27-28
[BIBLE]But now he is dead. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.[/BIBLE] 2 Sam. 12:23
[BIBLE]As the cloud fades and vanishes, so he who goes down to Sheol does not come up; he returns no more to his house, nor does his place know him anymore.[/BIBLE] Job 7:9-10
[BIBLE]He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes and comes not again.[/BIBLE] Ps. 78:39
There are more where that came from as well, such as Matthew 25:31-46 and Luke 23:39-43. As you asked for for me, a comprehensive thought behind it is necessary, "if it's possible."
If you want something comprehensive, here it is: None of the verses supplied by you or any who believe in Christian reincarnation necessarily indicate that idea without presupposing that not only does Scripture fit neatly into the first level of comprehension (in other words, that God speaks on the level of a very young child), but also that everyone who has gone before, the consensus of the whole Church for nearly two millennia, has failed to spot this "truth."
Are you willing to say, like Joseph Smith, that everyone before you (or the self-proclaimed prophet that wrote the book you linked) was wrong, and that only this circle of those who follow along know the "real truth?"
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I suppose my appealing to the Fathers means little without support:
Irenaeus (lived c.130-200. Studied under Polycarp, who was a student of the Apostle John), Against Heresies, Book II, Chapter 33. I suggest strongly that you read the whole thing, but here are some highlights.
We may subvert their doctrine as to transmigration from body to body by this fact, that souls remember nothing whatever of the events which took place in their previous states of existence.
With reference to these objections, Plato, that ancient Athenian, who also was the first to introduce this opinion, when he could not set them aside, invented the [notion of] a cup of oblivion, imagining that in this way he would escape this sort of difficulty. He attempted no kind of proof [of his supposition], but simply replied dogmatically [to the objection in question], that when souls enter into this life, they are caused to drink of oblivion by that demon who watches their entrance [into the world], before they effect an entrance into the bodies [assigned them].
For if the cup of oblivion, after it has been drunk, can obliterate the memory of all the deeds that have been done, how, O Plato, do you obtain the knowledge of this fact (since your soul is now in the body), that, before it entered into the body, it was made to drink by the demon a drug which caused oblivion?
If, therefore, the soul remembers nothing of what took place in a former state of existence, but has a perception of those things which are here, it follows that she never existed in other bodies, nor did things of which she has no knowledge, nor [once] knew things which she cannot [now mentally] contemplate.
Gregory of Nyssa (c.335-394, brother of Basil the Great), On the Making of Man, ch. 28:
Those who assert that the state of souls is prior to their life in the flesh, do not seem to me to be clear from the fabulous doctrines of the heathen which they hold on the subject of successive incorporation: for if one should search carefully, he will find that their doctrine is of necessity brought down to this. They tell us that one of their sages said that he, being one and the same person, was born a man, and afterwards assumed the form of a woman, and flew about with the birds, and grew as a bush, and obtained the life of an aquatic creature; - and he who said these things of himself did not, so far as I can judge, go far from the truth: for such doctrines as this of saying that one soul passed through so many changes are really fitting for the chatter of frogs or jackdaws, or the stupidity of fishes, or the insensibility of trees.
Even Origen, considered the champion for "Christian" reincarnation, says this
about the very verses you quote:
...t does not appear to me that by Elijah the soul is spoken of, lest I should fall into the dogma of transmigration, which is foreign to the church of God, and not handed down by the Apostles, nor anywhere set forth in the Scriptures.
(Commentary on Matthew, Book XIII, 1)
And on the words of the angel:
For, observe, he did not say in the soul of Elijah, in which case the doctrine of transmigration might have some ground, but in the spirit and power of Elijah.
(same commentary)
Hebrews 9:27 seems to say it all.
