There is only Aufklärung – Clearing Up. "That person is pretty clear". In a continuum of.. Zeitalter der Aufklärung - the Age of Clearing Up., would you go for demarcation of stages of clearing up? Like an evolution of clarity through some spiritual practice in spiritual culture, cultivation? Or, Maybe that someone recognizing there are degrees of clarity is an enlightenment at times that recognizes,,re-cognizes (allowing for) clarity as a variable in the brightness of the bulb illuminating and then what you do with that clarity. As orientation I feel there is a place for your Western analysis here.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <emptyb...@yahoo.com> wrote : You mean you aren't witnessing 24/7? ;-) Such a view shows just how pernicious the concept of enlightenment is in so called "spiritual culture". Witnessing (sakshi-chaitanyam) is the very nature of human existence and human intelligence. We are always witnessing 24/7/365. We could not exist otherwise. Aufklärung –Clearing Up. There is no thing as “enlightenment” - as that term is used here on FFL. There has never been some kind of “enlightenment” - whether such a state is discovered, realized or attained. That also includes immediate insights or gradual understandings. There is only Aufklärung – Clearing Up. So what is enlightenment? There never was and never will be such a thing - except as the title for a cultural movement in British history. This term was used as a title for an 18th century European cultural era, which in English was called “The Enlightenment” but originally in German was titled Zeitalter der Aufklärung - the Age of Clearing Up. In the past 50 years, the term “enlightenment” became a silly Neo-Hindu neologism (i.e. post-Vivekananda). Now-a-days, Buddhists also love to use this term as a synonym for the “kensho” or “satori” experience found in Japanese Zen – mostly by Euro-American Buddhist writers. Psssst … don’t tell anyone but any object, state or condition that has a beginning also has an end – by definition. “Experience”, also by definition, is a temporary appearance to a “perceiver”. Any experience of “enlightenment” likewise is just a transient occurrence that is judged (after the “fact”) to be “oh-so-significant”. Such “enlightenment” is utter make-believe. It is a yogically based misinterpretation of Shankara’s Advaita Vedanta.
