Animals are not conscious; we have reason. Animals ARE enlightened, but unconsciously. Enlightment means do the eternal will of your being, all animals (us included) are enlightened naturally, but humans repress it because of society. So it is not a question of reaching something, it is already there, but we do not see it.
What about my dog? I've taught him to behave in unnatural ways. Like, get the paper or my slippers. Have I influenced his unconsciousness?
1. A philosophical movement of the 18th century that emphasized the use of reason to scrutinize previously accepted doctrines and traditions and that brought about many humanitarian reforms. 2. (Buddhism & Hinduism) A blessed state in which the individual transcends desire and suffering and attains Nirvana. American Heritage Dictionary I don't see how animals would reach enlightenment as defined in 1. As for definition 2., I don't see how animals or humans can reach this kind of enlightenment. For one thing what is this 'blessed state' ?
So, for the definition of something as undefinable as God, you look at the dictionary? It is like looking "life" up in a dictionary and expect it to contain the wholeness of "life".
No, I looked up the definition of enlightenment. Not the definition of God... So as you are not satisfied with these definitions, what's yours ?
You didn't do anything that the dog didn't want to do therefore it is natural for your dog to retrieve things justlike most other dogs.What's so unnatural about that other than you taught him?
Well that's no help... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! How can you criticize my definitions when you can't come up with any yourself ?
Surely you're joking, right? Isn't that sorta' like "guilty until proven innocent"? Or "correct until proven incorrect"? ...LOL! Baron Max
It just seems hypocritical to me, thats all. My definitions come from a dictionary and it is therefor reasonable to assume they are commonly accepted. If you are going to deny them you better at least have a definition of your own.
I don't see much enlightenment, period. This discussion topic sounds a bit like two 80 years arguing about which of them has a better chance of running a four minute mile. One thinks he can cause he's a guy, the other thinks she can because women tend to live longer.
And what is enlightenment? Whose story do we decide to believe about enlightenment and why? Whose version of enlightenement? When someone says they have achieved it, why should we believe them? or believe their followers? Many people widely accepted as enlightened have later turned out to have done a rather nasty set of things behind closed doors. does this invalidate their followers experiences? is it possible that one can be quite deft with alternate states of consciousness and still be a real asshole?
I'm not too worried about the absolute meaning of enlightenment but many animals, ourselves included show plenty of signs of enjoying periods of blessed states for example. I'm particularly thinking about whales here but I saw a koala once seemingly meditating on a huge granite boulder overlooking the sea, he looked pretty much at one with the universe. Mind you he was probably whacked out on the good leaves as koalas often are. I would also put cockatoos in their own strange category which I won't even attempt to explain.
It seems like a lot of practices that intend to train us toward enlightenment aim at getting us to act and be like animals sometimes act and are: immersed completely in the moment, not split into two selves, spontaneous, direct, clear. I can remember once finding myself facing a wolf in the woods. It was walking toward me and was now very close. The wind must have been right to keep my smell away from him. I thought I was about to have to fight. He saw me. He turned. I am not skilled enough to describe the fluidity of this, but it was so clearly different from how I would have reacted. Direct, clear, absolutely unsplit, decisive. He may or may not have been scared. If he was scared the fear went directly into the change of direction. It was accepted completely. There was no wrestling with feelings or thought or one part of the wolf recovering or interpreting reactions, sense impressions, emotions, thoughts. One wolf almost walked up to a whole batch of discombobulated 'me's who were busy having some chaotic and not very productive decision making meeting. Fortunately we did not have to make a decision.
