Enlightenment And Rebirth. What Is The Value Of Enlightenment After We Die?

[lojong]

Hi Leo,

Rebirth is one of the topics I tend to think about the most. After watching many of your videos I still haven't heard anything on that topic coming from you and would like to know if you have anything to share about that, and I apologize if you do and I missed it. Many spiritual teachings, and most buddhist teachings (as far as I am aware) say we go through the cycles of life and death until we reach enlightenment, and that will free us from birth, that meaning, we won't have to go through the cycles or suffering anymore because we'll finally be "free" (from the matrix, in other words). I came in touch with that realization more deeply for the first time when taking my first 10 day silent Vipassana retreat a few years back, and was able to reflect on it. Since then, I started to think about the idea of life and death from a different perspective. The questions that keeps coming to my mind though are: we are leaning that enlightenment is the complete realization of no self and that we have no control whatsoever over what happens in our lives, we simply exist, and our bodies are alive, and that there is no such thing as an "individual soul", there's simply only one existence, and we all come from that one same fabric and basically everything comes from the same essence and all is "god" and awareness. I completely relate to that. 

And I can also relate to what the teachings say about the cycles of infinite incarnations and karmas and that we have to make progress to enlightenment to finally be free from the vicious cycle of suffering. But what I don't get is, who is free? And who is being reborn? What is that that separates the free and the ones going through rebirth since we are all one? So what is freedom from suffering? Is that only happening when the body is alive? Or does that continue after we die? So I guess my fundamental question here is: What is the value of enlightenment after we die? 

I know it is a deep topic and maybe too far out there,  but maybe you have something to share about it. If you have ever taken Vipassana with Goenka, maybe you'll relate to some of the things I'm bringing up. And just to be clear, this is not a dogmatic approach to the teachings, but a question that naturally comes and goes once I started the practice of meditation. 

Apologies for typos or brevity.

Thank you,

Christine

[Leo Gura]

I don't want to speculate about afterlife.