Prodigies! Wunderkinds! who are they?

Our dear old Wikipedia defines a prodigy as:

A child prodigy or Wunderkind is a person who, at an early age, develops one or more skills at a level far beyond the norm for their age

This boring definition isn’t really what intrigues me. Scientific definitions are very informative but far from being interesting. On the other hand, conventional and traditional stories about prodigies and how they come to be are far more interesting.

The scientific part of my brain would say that a prodigy is the product of two important requirements:

1. Superior genes, and what I mean is, someone who is born with a natural inclination or outstanding capabilities in some area of life, it could be artistic (musical or photographic), athletic (superior physical endurance or performance) or superior analytically capabilities that scientist prodigies have (usually not all at once).
2. A supporting environment and that is usually a child’s home, school and neighborhood. Being born to a family line of athletes might give someone an edge over the “average” human being, but if this person is not raised and nourished to develop his natural given talent, chances are high that this person would never achieve anything notable in his life time.

Having laid the scientific ground for who Prodigies are… let me introduce you to the intriguing part of this topic. Please read through the next section.

I was born to Druze parents; Druze believe in reincarnation, that is, the transmigration of the soul from one body to another. So what does reincarnation have to do with Prodigies? I will tell you soon, but first I want to explain few concepts of how Druze see reincarnation:

• What Druze mean by reincarnation is simply the transmigration of souls from one body to another. The souls of every man or woman who die, are transmigrated into new-born babies (of the same sex), and not into animals or trees or stones…
• Every baby, has had past lives. Reincarnation is not some phenomenon that happens to some selected few. Very few people remember their past lives and those who do remember their past lives, usually remember it at infancy (maybe up to 2 or 3 years) and tend to forget it at older age. The fact that most human beings don’t remember their past lives is not a proof that their past lives do not exist.
• It is important to understand that we are not talking about some “Insidious movie” where children are possessed by other people’s souls… NO! Druze believe that every new-born baby wouldn’t be alive, until a soul is transmigrated into this baby’s body; So reincarnation isn’t some evil process happening to babies, it is simply the normal cycle of life.

I believe this topic is so deep and deserves its own post; but considering that this post is about “Prodigies”, I will stop right here and get back to our original topic.

So here is the intriguing part. Druze believe that people who are born with extra ordinary talents at very young age are simply those who carried on these talents from their previous lives. Think about it! Our bodies are only temporary and our souls are eternal. Souls are our collective consciousness, the unseen power that drives our brain. Is it so strange that we had previous lives that we can’t remember? Is it so hard to believe? What happens to a person who has a brain injury in the Hippocampus (maybe due to a stroke). He looses his long-term memory. So if we can’t maintain our memories due to an injury, is it so hard to believe we can’t maintain our previous lives memories after re-birth.

I have no concrete or scientific proof that reincarnation is true, all I have is few incredible stories about people who remember their past lives. But… You have to admit… this topic is very intriguing … Oh and it also means that Einstein, Plato, Neuton, Aristo, Mozart and Beethoven are all alive, they are just busy playing a new kind of music, inventing the next Iphone or possibly just busy playing some video game 😉