Is enlightenment a joke?

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Yep, and it’s a great one to be in on.

Enlightenment is a big idea that ties together a lot of varied spiritual contexts. The Buddhists probably have the most to say about it, but since it literally encapsulates the idea of individual perfection, every other religion, every other form of spirituality, winds up arriving at it or something like it.

So as a result discussions about enlightenment invariably become free-for-alls, especially when “ordinary” people who could give a toss about it pipe in and make the perfectly valid observation that the people who talk most about enlightenment often seem the least enlightened, at least at that particular moment.

So people who are really into spirituality and growth realize that there’s no more pedagogic value to be had out of the discussion so they just stop taking it seriously.

Claiming you’re enlightened is great fun. I’m all like, “go ahead brah, call me on it! I dare ya!” The big joke here is that anybody can claim they’re enlightened and nobody can prove them wrong, so it turns into a great game of poker, where the people who are in on it have tons of fun gently teasing each other and those who are still taking the discussion Way Too Seriously.

The game and joke are interesting because they reveal all kinds of really subtle questions about enlightenment that you would never run into otherwise. Like someone with a Zen background that’s still taking the discussion seriously might launch into an exposition on koans, not realizing that nobody’s actually looking for techniques, just at the meta-discussion. But koans are actually pretty cool and thinking about them might help me in my own practice.

All in all, you get out of it what you put into it. You can have fun and still do great work at the same time.