What does forgiveness have to do with your spiritual freedom?

Vic Shayne
author
13 Pillars of Enlightenment: How to realize your true nature and end suffering

An artist-unknown painting depicting the Buddha with the crazed sinner Angulimala on the loose.

The relationship between sin, forgiveness, karma, and redemption, as well as birth, death, and resurrection — all of which are creations of the egoic self, the sense of a “me” or “I” — is related to the seemingly elusive spiritual freedom (moksha) promised by awakened teachers.

Whether we look at forgiveness as a literal or metaphorical action, it is entwined with life, death and rebirth all at once. Forgiveness leads to freedom in life, and can lead to the (metaphorical) death of the imprisoned egoic self, and this leads to rebirth or transformation.

The sinner who turns into a saint
There is an oft repeated theme in mythology and lore of the sinner who turns saint by way of redemption. And the ultimate example is an awakened figure who has traveled the path from the archetypal Innocent or even Warrior to the Sinner whose life is mired in suffering, and then this figure evolves into the Sage or Saint via redemption and his ensuing illumination.

But there is a commonly overlooked, yet significant, aspect of the sinner-saint relationship that keeps the self in a perpetual state of bondage and…