I couldn't help but notice that when I posted my "take" on the recent discussions about what life and the "I" and such things are like after enlight- enment, several people (Tom, Jim and Ron) reacted a bit...uh...reactively. It sounded to me as if they were a tad distressed by my suggestion that NO description of enlightenment could ever be true or correct.
To follow up a bit, I was *not* just being a con- trarian or trying to push your buttons. I've thought about this a great deal over the years. I've had a number of enlightenment experiences, and not one of them was exactly like any description of such exper- iences I'd heard or read over the years, many of them coming from supposedly-enlightened beings. At best they were crude approximations of the reality; at worst they were completely off the mark. I think that what may be going on is that a number of people who paid their dues in the TM movement don't realize how heavily they have been influenced by Patanjali and his hangups. He may have *been* enlightened. But he was also a Class A religious fanatic. Given the politics of his day, he lobbied heavily to "prove" Hinduism superior to any other "competing" religions, and also to "prove" his particular sect of it superior to all others. He traveled around challenging others to verbal "duels" to "prove" such things. In my opinion, that is one of the major reasons that TMers tend to believe that the descriptions they have been given of higher states of consciousness are accurate, or that such descriptions *can* be accurate. TM springs very much from the Patanjali tradition, with its hangups about being "best," and about having every word that the teacher utters be believed as gospel, and as if it represents "truth." I honestly believe that NO words attempting to describe enlightenment are true. The most that they can *ever* be is someone trying to give a rough approximation of an impression of what it's all about. The map is *not* the territory. The words used to describe enlightenment are *not* enlight- enment. And I can prove it. :-) Here's the challenge -- write something here on FFL that is completely true. I define, for the purpose of this challenge, some statement that is true for all beings, in all periods of time (past, present and future), in all contexts, and when viewed from all states of consciousness. I'll wait. :-) It's not an easy challenge. There was a kind of academic contest on the same subject a few years ago. And *they* didn't even have to deal with the "from all states of consciousness" rule that I threw in above. The best they could come up with was, "This too shall pass." But add the state of consciousness rule, and from a state of consciousness that embraces timelessness or the non-existence of time, even "This too shall pass" is not true. So have a go at it, eh? And if you are able to come up with some statement -- any statement -- that is true for all beings, in all periods of time, in all contexts, and when viewed from all states of con- sciousness, *then* come back and tell me how accurate you believe the words of the supposedly enlightened are when describing what it's like. I'll wait.
