Now that Episode III is over, I am always thinking about that conversation aboard the Tantive IV among Yoda and Obi-Wan about how Qui-Gon will train them to retain their identies after death.

Finally. The answer to the 6 year question of why Qui-Gon did not return as a ghost or disappear when he died was finally anwered, and it just so happens that the answer comes from Qui-Gon himself.

In the first Last of the Jedi book, Obi-Wan has his first conversation with Qui-Gon in about 13 years. I was so glad to see the return of one of my favorite characters. Earlier in the book, it mentions that Qui-Gon gained the knowledge of how to retain his identity from the "Ancient order of the Whills".

That part of the book posed some questions:

1. How did Qui-Gon discover the Ancient Order of the Whills? Did he learn the actual knowledge by reading the mythic Journal of the Whills?

My guess is that Qui-Gon had an advantage by bending the rules of the Jedi, and he discovered this during his off time, not on a mission.

2. Why wouldn't he have discussed this knowledge with any of the Jedi?

This is really off the wall but maybe he gained this knowledge after death. Maybe the Ancient Order of the Whills is something within the Force itself, and you have to be one with the Force to gain it's knowledge. However I don't know why he wouldn't have told Yoda this during one of their first conversations after his death as seen in Yoda: Dark Rendezvous.

Whatever the answers may be, I wonder if Qui-Gon could be considered a "Master" of the Force since he was the first to learn of it's secrets (unless other Jedi/Sith of the past learned it too but kept it to themselves).