If you take into account all the various religious traditions and strip away all the trappings, you get a simple recognition that there is a higher power and eternal life. Traditions suggest that there is a purpose to life and that we are to love one another.
Simpler yet is the recognition that the the primary experience of life is awareness. From the Hebrew "I am" to the Hindu "You are That," it's all the same awareness.
Everything that is aware is living. What we are aware of may be different, but the fact of awareness is the ground of experience. The question is whether this awareness is the same in all living beings. The answer is yes. I recall Nisargadatta saying that the awareness in him and the awareness in a donkey were the same. The fact that the awareness is filtered through a different lens does not change the ground of awareness.
Enlightenment is simply the knowing that we are ultimately that awareness and not the particular form that is aware. This experience gives us the sense of eternal life. There may be an ongoing individual soul, or not. It doesn't matter. We are that eternal awareness. I can do nothing but trust that because I am That, and that is all there is. This is so fundamental for me that all religion is just the wrapping on a gift. The gift is inside, always and forever.
