Ian, do you have a 'go to' definition/frame for enlightened-ness? I know very little about JK, I recall Shinzen saying that he seemed to 'get' something but that his teaching led to a lot of his students talking about JK instead of putting what he said into practice.
Personally I don't like these terms. They only start Buddhist flame wars and confuse people. Seems to me that "enlightenment" is just a placeholder for some vague notion of an "ultimate" attainment. The meaning changes depending on a tradition's language, culture, or metaphysics.
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Trying to get enlightened is a fool's errand, because it's a completely arbitrary goal. If you want insight into impermanence, do the specific practices that bring about that insight. If you want to glimpse emptiness or no-self, do the respective practices for these insights.
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Obviously it's a bit more complicated than that, but it's much more useful than lumping together 2,500 years of spiritual development across a variety of cultures.
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Much as I agree with many of your points, I think you are falling victim to some of the same language games here: the usefulness of wanting to get enlightened is entirely dependent on what is meant by it, and the awareness one has of the ramifications *in context* - which varies.
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It's true & worth entertaining that most of the traditions find "seeking" or wanting to get enlightened problematic, but there are pretty clear reasons why - and not of the "starts Buddhist flame wars" variety, since that's more of an opt-in sort of problem, at least on this end.
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By flame wars I didn't literally mean internet wars (clear evidence that I'm not immune to misusing terminology). I meant just people from varying traditions arguing over what enlightenment is, who's more enlightened than who, etc, as if they're all talking about the same thing.
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Well, indeed, no need to label that as flame wars. Actual wars have been fought over that.
- End of conversation
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