As I understand enlightenment

[Arif Ghamiq]

Could there be a literal reality to the meaning of "enlightened" ??

I know the Sanskrit word bodhi means "awakened", but aside from the English word there is the Latin word illuminare and the Arabic term for enlightenment or illumination - Tanwir, which comes from the same root as noor meaning light and/or illumination.

I guess what I'm asking is - does enlightenment indicate the awakening or reception of what might be an actual light - a "spiritual" light (as I do) or is it just pure metaphor ??

 

[RJM]

I guess what I'm asking is - does enlightenment indicate the awakening or reception of what might be an actual light - a "spiritual" light (as I do) or is it just pure metaphor ??

Matthew 6:22-23
The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.
But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

I think traditionally full enlightenment arrives with the opening of the thousand petal Sahasrara chakra at the crown of the head. Chakras open one after the other from bottom to top, until at last the sahasrara chakra becomes active.

The chakra just below the sahasrara is the Ajna chakra in the centre of the forehead, known as the third-eye.

As chakras open they bestow increasing powers and abilities. The opening of the sahasrara chakra is the attainment of full awareness?

The sahasrara chakra is similar to the Kether sephorith in the kaballah and is also linked to Taoist yoga of immortality called the Secret of the Golden Flower, and to the western alchemical achievement of the philosophers' stone that transforms lead into gold (base/natural into spiritual)?

Traditionally enlightenment seems to mean the opening of the final door to full mastery/awareness -- at the culmination of a longer process, obviously.

 

[KnowSelf]

Enlightenment means I don’t have to ask what is enlightenment

 

[Cino]

Enlightenment means I don’t have to ask what is enlightenment

Then a Western Buddhist fundamentalist who has a strong opinion of their understanding of enlightenment being the only correct one and never has the urge to consider other views or approaches - is enlightened?

 

[Cino]

I guess what I'm asking is - does enlightenment indicate the awakening or reception of what might be an actual light - a "spiritual" light (as I do) or is it just pure metaphor ??

This mental quality which lends itself to descriptions involving brightness, luminosity, clarity and so on, is widely reported across humanity's traditions.

I like it as a quasi-intersubjective signpost, because it does not concern the subject matter content of conscious experience, whether chakras or throne chariots or elevator numbers of the many heavens.

 

[RJM]

Pax vobiscum

Et tu

 

[KnowSelf]

Then a Western Buddhist fundamentalist who has a strong opinion of their understanding of enlightenment being the only correct one and never has the urge to consider other views or approaches - is enlightened?

I cannot speak for the Western Buddhist fundamentalist only what I believe. Nor can I support the notion that enlightenment is only for the select. This forum has opened my mind to believe differently. In an earlier post i asked if everybody think the way do; flowing river of God's blessings, living in God's spirit all of the time without ending. This is enlightenment as I understand i to be.

It's only fun when we figure things out for ourselves.