I understand what you are saying as the result of spirtual life in and for a person. I sense that what you are speaking about is the personal path. I also assume that this forum was founded for persons who want to learn about and be inspired toward such a personal path (that results in enlightenment, so-called). I might say 'I have no argument with that', and yet I have done and do a good deal of arguing. In my case the Fourm (what QR and S put in motion) has value because it sends out a challenge. It makes a definite statement, it sets down a stone, it declares, it takes a stand. When one confronts that, one has to 'answer'. It is as if someone says: 'This is what I understand and this is why. What do you think of that?'Beingof1 wrote:The explanation of illumination is clarity of awareness. Some of the signs of it are to be void of envy, appreciation for all of life, agape/compassion (tho you might disagree with my methods), self honesty, self respect, humility, a master of forgiveness and balance in all things.
You have to answer. If the question has meaning, you can answer superficially or more profoundly. My interpretation of myself is to understand that I choose to answer but to answer has involved me in a Total Review. Unlike Russell - and this can clearly be seen in his exposition - he dismisses everything in favor of Enlightenment. How could one, and why would one, argue against a man and his personal choice? One cannot. But when totalising statemenes are made, and grand condemnations, or one develops a position of condemnation of man, achievement, scientia, our history, and the work of uncounted generations of men who have struggled to arrive at definitions, and platforms from which 'a world' has been built, and when all of this is dismissed imperiously, and further: when one notices destructive, nihilistic trends operating in the world generally, and the result of decadent processes, and the prospect of loss of what has been attained: at that point the totalising, dismissive statements, when they are couched as expressions of Absolute Truth, become in a way 'sinful'. To be wrong is one thing, but to sin against truth is another. (To refer to 'sin' is to refer to a willful choice, a deliberate action, but one cannot dismiss igorance either, but who assumes reposibility for ignorance?)
So, I would say that I recognise those qualities and those attainments (or results) that you have named as certainly important, but the larger conversation here is more to my interest. The conversation I would define would propose Illumination, yes, (but not 'enlightenment' since no one can define it), and then Civilization: another way of referring to the Polis.