Many people have interests and hobbies in a certain area. There are also some people who have no interests or hobbies at all. That is, they have no particular interest or passion when it comes to any of the occupations or types of specialized activities, or various people, events, and things with which people frequently come into contact in the world—they are just ordinary people. For example, if someone asks them whether they are passionate about literature, whether they usually keep a diary or write articles, they say, “I am not passionate about it and am not adept at it. As soon as I start reading or writing, I get a headache.” If they are given some literary masterpieces to read, they find it overwhelming, and are completely unwilling in their hearts. Some even say, “Staring at text all the time strains my eyes and turns me old, so I don’t like literature.” If you ask them whether they like dancing, they say, “Dancing is not a proper affair, it is something people do when they find themselves idle and have nothing better to do. I don’t like dancing.” You see, they do not like it and even find a reason for this, saying it is not a proper affair. Others dance to praise God—how positive a thing this is! Singing, dancing, playing the harp and lyre to praise God—this has been done since ancient times; it is something God approves of, so how can it not be a proper affair? But for them, they belittle and speak about everything they do not like as something negative. When asked, “You don’t like dancing—then do you like singing?” “What ‘singing’? As soon as I start singing, I go off-key. Even I find it unbearable to hear. I don’t like singing. Only now as a believer in God have I started learning some hymns of God’s words and experiential hymns. Before I believed in God, I never sang; when others sang, I was not even willing to listen.” “Then how do you express yourself when you are in a happy mood?” “When I am in a happy mood, I just take a nap.” “Then what do you do when you encounter painful matters and are in an unhappy mood?” “Then I eat some snacks, or just take a nap.” “You don’t like singing—then do you like listening to music?” “I don’t have that interest, and I don’t understand what is being expressed in music. You all say that music expresses people’s various emotions, that it expresses people’s thoughts and feelings, but I don’t understand these and can’t relate to them. Music is high art—a lowly person like myself can’t relate to music, and I don’t like it.” “Do you like good food?” “I don’t like good food either. I can eat anything. I was born a rough individual. I can eat cornmeal, I can eat cake, I can eat Chinese food or Western food—anything. And if I’m starving and have nothing to eat, I can even eat dog food.” Such people are just this coarse. Ask some women, “Do you like cosmetics?” They say, “I have no interest in them. However I was born is how I look—whoever wants to look at me can look at me, and whoever doesn’t want to look at me can just look away!” Ask some men, “Do you like electronics or mechanical things such as cars?” They say, “What is the use of liking those things? It drains the mind and tires the brain. If I have time, it would be better to take a nap or have a casual chat!” They do not like anything and have no interests or hobbies at all. Whether it is biological, technological, high-end, or low-end, they do not like any of it. When asked, “These things that involve humanity, whether they are refined or of broad appeal—you do not like any of them. Then do you like little animals, such as cats, dogs, and birds?” “I like them even less. Animals can’t talk to people—what is the use of liking them?” Some people are interested in dogs. They often talk to dogs, and dogs can even understand human speech. Some people have no hobbies at all and are not interested in anything—there are many such people. Some people say, “We are born with some interests and hobbies—they are given by God. Especially those among us who have a strength in a certain area, those born with exceptional and outstanding talent in this area—this is all God’s grace, God’s exaltation, God looking upon us with favor. Especially nowadays, taking on a duty related to our interests, hobbies, or strengths in God’s house even more so makes our identity and worth incomparably honorable and extraordinary. Those who have no hobbies or strengths can only do some basic labor and work that isn’t technically demanding, such as hosting, cooking, cleaning, or growing vegetables, raising pigs, and feeding chickens. So in terms of people’s interests, hobbies, and strengths, aren’t people distinguished between high and low, noble and base? Isn’t there a hierarchical difference between them?” Is this viewpoint correct? (No.) You see, God has given some people strengths, has ordained some people with certain interests and hobbies, while for some other people, God has not ordained anything—they have no strengths at all, cannot sing or dance, do not understand literature, and are completely ignorant of all kinds of professional skills. Just as it happens, there may be a host family that keeps two dogs, so having such a person with no strengths feed the dogs should be suitable—this is the simplest task. But apart from feeding the dogs, they do not take them for walks, and do not know how to care for them. After feeding them for a year or two, even the dogs do not recognize them as their master and are not close to them. Tell Me, what kind of person is this? Compared to those who have interests and hobbies or strengths in a certain area, isn’t there a difference? Clearly, these are two types of people who have differences in their innate conditions: One type lives with a strong sense of superiority, leading a rich and full life, while the other type leads an empty life, without any sense of superiority. So if people are distinguished by differences in status and worth based on this principle, is that appropriate? (No.) Then according to what principle is it appropriate to distinguish them? Tell Me, are there differences between people? (Yes.) Where do the differences lie? How should people be distinguished? At the very least, one should look at whether they love the truth—distinguishing their essence, their highness and lowness, their nobility and baseness, and their category based on their attitude toward the truth. Theoretically, can’t people be distinguished this way very easily? (Yes.) Is this way of distinguishing people good? (Yes.) But is it a bit too simple to distinguish them this way? Some people do not have any innate strengths, nor do they have any interests or hobbies—they are very mediocre people, very simple people. However, they love the truth, understand the truth, have experience and understanding of the truth, and when they fellowship about the truth, they can share their understanding of God’s words; in life entry, they are better than the average person. They can help many people. So can you say that such people are lowly and worthless? (No.) Theoretically, people’s essence, their highness and lowness, their nobility and baseness, and their category should be distinguished based on their attitude toward the truth, but how exactly should they be distinguished? That is what we will fellowship about today.

The Three Categories of People Based on Their Origins

Whether a person inherently has any interests, hobbies and strengths is preordained by God. If God gives them to you, then you have them; if God does not give them to you, then you do not have them—you cannot learn them, nor can you gain them through imitation. However, if you possess a strength in a certain area, and you say, “Doing duty related to this strength is too exhausting; I do not want this strength,” even if you do not want it, you cannot remove it, nor can others take it away. What you have, others cannot take away; what you don’t have, you cannot seize or obtain by vying for it. All of this is related to God’s preordination. However, that being said, God’s giving you a certain interest, hobby, or strength does not mean that God must have you do some duty or work related to your interest, hobby, or strength. Some people say, “Since I am not asked to do a duty in this area or engage in work related to this, then why was I given such an interest, hobby, or strength?” God has given the vast majority of people certain interests and hobbies based on each person’s various conditions. There are, of course, multiple things that are taken into consideration: For one thing, it is for people’s livelihood and survival; for another, it is to enrich people’s lives. Sometimes, a person’s life requires certain interests and hobbies, whether for entertainment and amusement or so they can engage in some proper tasks, thereby making their human life fulfilling. Of course, no matter from which aspect it is viewed, there is reason behind God’s giving, and God also has His reasons and grounds for not giving. It may be that your human life or your survival does not require that God give you interests, hobbies, and strengths, and you can maintain your livelihood or enrich your human life and make it fulfilling through other means. In short, regardless of whether God has given people interests, hobbies, and strengths or not, this is not an issue with people themselves. Even if someone has no strengths, this is not a defect of their humanity. People should comprehend this correctly and treat it correctly. If one possesses certain interests, hobbies, and strengths, then they should cherish them and apply them correctly; if they do not have them, they should not complain. From the perspective of interests, hobbies, and strengths, this is the actual situation. However, whether one has these things does not reflect a person’s worth, status, or identity. So what does this tell people? Even if God has given you refined interests, hobbies, and strengths—these are your private possessions, they are your advantageous conditions—you having them does not mean that you are nobler than anyone else, that you are more advantaged or privileged to do anything than anyone else. This is because in God’s eyes, no matter what innate conditions a person has, they are a member of corrupt humankind. Although innate conditions do not contain elements of corruption, all people, who possess innate conditions, have been corrupted by Satan and live by satanic dispositions. Their life essence is their satanic corrupt disposition. Therefore, regardless of what your innate conditions are like and regardless of whether you have interests, hobbies, and strengths or not, in God’s eyes, since the life essence of all people is the same, your worth is equal to that of others. People should see clearly that even if they have certain advantageous conditions or certain advantages, in terms of human essence and corrupt dispositions, the essence of all people is the same and all people are the same. They must undergo God’s chastisement and judgment, and they are all ones whom God wishes to save. In terms of the life essence of people’s flesh, people are the same. However, from another perspective, there are some distinctions between people, and we need to fellowship in detail about these distinctions. How should these distinctions be identified? They must be examined from people’s origins. What does “origins” refer to? It refers to what a person has been reincarnated from—distinctions are made based on how they came into being and what they came from. Broadly speaking, this humankind is divided into three categories. The first category is those reincarnated from animals, the second is those reincarnated from various devils, and the third is those reincarnated from humans. These three categories distinguish people at the very root. The reason they can distinguish people is that the origins of different categories of people are not the same. So how can one know who is reincarnated from animals, who is reincarnated from devils, and who is reincarnated from humans? This must be determined based on what they live out and the characteristics they display. Have you ever heard such information before, whether in folklore or through other channels? (Yes.) So this topic is not entirely unfamiliar to you, is it? (No, it isn’t.) Those reincarnated from animals, those reincarnated from devils, those reincarnated from humans—which one do you want to hear about first? (The first category.) The first category is those reincarnated from animals. If you truly come to know the truth about this matter, will it have an impact on your lives? Will it bring trouble or hindrances? (I might start wondering what I have been reincarnated from.) For some people, once they truly know which category they belong to and match themselves to a particular category, if they are indeed reincarnated from humans, they feel fortunate and quite good about it. But if they are not reincarnated from humans, wouldn’t they find that upsetting? (Yes.) It would bring certain difficulties and also some unease, wouldn’t it? (Yes.) Since it can bring unease and some difficulties, is it better for people to know or not to know? (I feel like knowing would be better.) In what way would it be better? (By knowing, one can understand the truth in this regard, and additionally, they will be able to discern some of the people, events, and things around them.) Then let’s fellowship about this.

The Characteristics of People Reincarnated From Animals

Let’s first fellowship about those who are reincarnated from animals. Reincarnation from animals, as the name implies, means that such a person was reincarnated from an animal. The scope of animals is quite broad—as for exactly how many types of animals can reincarnate as humans, that is not within the scope of our fellowship. In short, there is a category of people whose past existence was as an animal, meaning that their original identity or created category was not among created humankind. Their initial, first biological category was that of an animal. So in God’s eyes, their identity within the biological realm is that of an animal. In this reincarnation, they have become human, meaning that this animal is no longer reborn among animals but has instead reincarnated as a human, being born at a certain time, into a certain family, lineage, and country. An animal reincarnated into a human means that they are born as a human, but their previous existence was not as a human—it was as an animal. Before, they existed within the animal realm, being reborn among animals; now, in this rebirth, they are no longer within the animal realm. Their identity has changed, and they have become a member of humankind. This is what is called animals being reincarnated as humans. When an animal reincarnates as a human, their appearance and instincts are essentially the same as those of any person within humankind. That is, they fully possess the characteristics of a human—they can walk upright, have human facial features and appearance, and possess human thinking, human instincts, and a normal human life, and they also have the unique human ability for language. This is what is known as an animal reincarnating as a human. That is, from their physical form, external appearance, and physical life characteristics, you can only see human traits; no animal traits are visible. So how can you know that they are reincarnated from an animal? This is what people are most concerned about. Of course, it is possible to see that they are reincarnated from an animal. If there were no differences between those reincarnated from animals and those reincarnated from humans, then this category of people would not have any obvious characteristics. Precisely because there are obvious differences between those reincarnated from animals and those reincarnated from true humans, these two categories of people can thus be readily distinguished based on their characteristics. So what are the characteristics of people reincarnated from animals? The first characteristic is that they have distorted comprehension. The second characteristic is that they are especially numb. The third characteristic is that they are especially muddleheaded. The fourth characteristic is that they are foolish. These four characteristics alone are enough to make evident the difference between a person reincarnated from an animal and a true human.

I. The First Characteristic: Distorted Comprehension

The first characteristic of people reincarnated from animals is that they have distorted comprehension. Firstly, what does distortion involve? It involves problems with their thoughts and viewpoints; it also involves their cognitive abilities to view, comprehend, and understand things. This category of people cannot correctly comprehend anything, nor can they correctly view anything. Their way of viewing people and things, as well as their self-conduct and actions, is especially absurd, obstinate, and ridiculous—completely incompatible with the thinking of normal humanity, and the thoughts and viewpoints of normal humanity on things. Of course, people with distorted comprehension are nowhere close to understanding or coming to know the truth. The truth is wholly beyond their reach, let alone do they understand the truth principles. Their viewpoints are completely distorted when it comes to how they treat any thing or individual. After you fellowship with them, they understand it in terms of doctrine, but their knowledge remains just as distorted afterward. When you then explain things more clearly and specifically, giving examples, at the time, they may understand, but later, when they encounter the same kind of thing, their viewpoint remains just as distorted, and no matter how they’re fellowshipped with, it does not correct their viewpoint. Moreover, this state of theirs—this way of comprehending things—will persist indefinitely without change. No one’s fellowship of the truth can change them; even if I fellowship and give sermons, it still cannot change their distorted thoughts and viewpoints and distorted way of comprehending things. Such people are very troublesome. For example, when they do something wrong, and you tell them, “What you did was incorrect, it does not align with the principles; there was personal adulteration in it,” they will say, “I didn’t do it on purpose. I didn’t intend for it to turn out that way. Since you’re all so good, you have the truth, and you know how to do things, why don’t you do it yourselves instead of having me do it? You say I did it wrong—isn’t that just because you find me displeasing? Since you all have humanity, and I’m the only one without it, I’ll just go to hell and you can all go to heaven!” They may even try to defend and justify themselves with reasoning, and come up with excuses to shirk responsibility. They refuse to acknowledge that they did wrong, do not have the correct attitude, and do not commit to correcting themselves in the future and say that they understand how they should act next time. They will never understand in this way and will never comprehend the matter from the perspective of humanity in a pure way. There are even some people who, when you point out problems in their work and fellowship the truth with them, say, “Aren’t you just looking down on me? Isn’t it just because I’m uneducated and from the countryside? Isn’t it just because my status is low? Even God does not disdain me, so what right do you have to?” They will never admit that they did wrong and then seek the truth, reflect on themselves to see where they went wrong, and look for the correct path of practice to resolve it. Why will they never do this? Because they are not human. They do not have normal human thinking, and they cannot approach mistakes that arise in the way a normal human would. They do not have the attitude that a normal human should have toward mistakes. Have you ever encountered such people? It would be best to reflect on yourself as well, to see if your reason is normal or not. For example, after someone mops the floor, the surface is still quite wet. Someone else, unaware of this, walks over and slips. That person gets up and says to the other, “You didn’t dry the floor properly after you mopped. You should have put up a sign with a few words to remind people! Thankfully, I’m young—if I fall, I can get back up. But if it were an elderly person, wouldn’t they have broken a bone? You really weren’t considerate enough!” Are these words proper and normal? (Yes, they’re normal.) The person mopping was not considerate enough when doing this task, so next time they should be more considerate. Since someone fell because of it, it is clear that they made a mistake in this matter. This was an oversight, and no one has condemned them—they just need to correct it. But they are unable to correctly and rationally consider or approach this matter from the perspective of a human or with the thinking of a human. Instead, they turn around and say, “Couldn’t you see the floor was wet? Are you blind? You slipped and fell—serves you right! You don’t use your own eyes, and that’s my fault? When you’ve finished mopping the floor, of course it’s going to be wet—why did you walk on it? It’s not like I told you to walk there. Just admit it’s your own bad luck that you fell. It has nothing to do with me!” Are these words rational? (No.) They are not rational—what is a colloquial way of saying this? They’re unreasonable. You mopped the floor but didn’t dry it, causing someone to slip—while it’s not absolutely necessary for you to express guilt and apology, you should at least accept others’ reminders and pointers regarding your mistake. You should ask, “Are you injured? Do you need to go to the hospital for a check-up or treatment? I take full responsibility.” This is the correct attitude. This is how a person should rationally treat and reflect on something they did wrong from the perspective of humanity. However, people reincarnated from animals have no humanity and distorted comprehension. They never speak this way, nor do they ever consider any issue this way. Instead, they are willfully unreasonable. They didn’t dry the floor after mopping, causing someone to slip; next time, then, they just need to do it differently, pay more attention, and correct the mistake—that’s it. The issue would be resolved. It’s a very simple matter: No one has said anything about it, and no one has condemned them for it. They also haven’t been required to bear any legal responsibility. But they refuse to accept the facts and instead say, “Oh, so you’re all good people, you’re the only ones with humanity! I must be an evil person! I deliberately harm others! I have bad intentions! You’ll all go to heaven, and I’ll go to hell!” Tell Me, could a normal person utter such drivel? (No.) Only the type of people reincarnated from animals comprehend everything and view everything from a particularly extreme, obstinate, and ridiculous perspective. Over the smallest matter—something completely legitimate—they can spout a whole slew of unreasonable, fallacious arguments, leaving others at a loss whether to laugh or cry. If they are pruned, how do they behave? They go to great lengths to justify and defend themselves, explaining why they acted the way they did and how much they suffered for it, arguing back with all kinds of reasons. When you fellowship with them about why they were pruned, how, when they make mistakes, they should correct them and how they should seek the truth principles, and what the principles for handling the matter are, they refuse to take in a single word. Instead, they hold in their rage and anger, feeling wronged and humiliated. Behind the scenes, they even complain to others, saying, “Hmph! I hadn’t considered those issues, and I didn’t intentionally mean to do it that way. Yet they condemn me and say I was disrupting and disturbing—am I really that evil? Am I an evil person?” When it comes to the truth principles, they will always fall short of them and never understand them; their comprehension is always especially distorted and especially ridiculous. No matter what truth principles are fellowshipped, when it reaches them, it turns into a single phrase, a single way of acting—it becomes a formality, a ritual, a regulation. It is not just a matter of comprehending the truth principles in a one-sided way; rather, their comprehension is especially ridiculous and absurd. The way this type of person comprehends the truth appears especially clumsy and idiotic. To what extent is it idiotic? To the extent that people don’t even feel pity for them but instead feel outright disgust, at a loss whether to laugh or cry, and completely speechless. Things have already been explained to such an extent that saying anything more is redundant—any further words would only be silly. There is no point in continuing to talk about the truth principles with these people. No matter what they handle, even the smallest matter in daily life, they do so in such an abnormal, ridiculous, and distorted way. They are incapable of viewing and handling matters within the bounds of human reason. Their perspective on everything is this obstinate and this ridiculous—the views they could express about any matter would make you feel disgusted for a lifetime after hearing them. If you happened to be eating while hearing them, you might just vomit on the spot. Tell Me, just how distorted must they be? This is one of the primary characteristics of people reincarnated from animals—they are obstinate and ridiculous. From the perspective of humanity, this obstinacy and ridiculousness is primarily a lack of normal thinking of humanity. They are unable to consider any issue according to the normal thinking of humanity—they are extreme, prone to distortions, and obstinate. No matter how you fellowship about the truth, objective facts, or specific situations, they cling tightly to their reasoning and refuse to let go. They think, “I’ve got reason on my side, and I haven’t given you anything you can use against me. I’m just gonna cling to this reasoning, and it will become the truth. Nothing you say will be of any use!” This is one of the characteristics of people reincarnated from animals—their comprehension is distorted.