Expert: Bodhicitta - 8/30/2006

Question
i have a very difficult question i was wondering if you could help me answer. i was contemplating reincarnation and i am having trouble understanding what "it" is that passes from life to life. if i understand correctly there is no separate nature to anything, and so this rules out the possibility of an immortal soul. is it purely attachment that goes from life to life? if so what are the dynamics of this? how does attachment remain separate? is it purely by its own delusion that it exists? if it does go into another body is this like the core of my existing? (i.e. is this experience without the five senses or conception?) is it possible that at death we are unified with the universe as one and then new people are created out of this oneness, and so those new people have parts of memory that was realy strong and so they can recall it as their own? thankyou for any help you can give to me on this

yours sincerely

Michael  

Answer
Hi Michael
Thanks for your good question.

This is a much misunderstood area. Like all Buddhist
questions then the answer only makes any sense if you
meditate. Buddhism really contains no theory worthy of note. All the Buddhist ideas are starting points for meditation. Buddhism cuts across fixed notions of how things are which we cling to.
Do you meditate? if not I would recommend starting to
seek out the truth.

I will say one thing concerning your question. Have you seen the film the matrix? Or maybe you have had a vivid
dream and thought it very real, but it disappeared when you awoke? In Buddhism the world is said to be like that.
An illusion. Like a cinema film. So the question is not
really perhaps what goes from life to life. But more
why do we believe there is any world at all?

Not sure if that helps?
Bodhicitta