Impersonal Enlightenment Quote

A Raging Forest Fire Many years ago I was asked, "What is the difference between personal enlightenment and impersonal enlightenment?" I answered, “What is the difference between a burning match and a raging forest fire?” It's only now, years later, that I am actually beginning to see the fulfillment of this vision that I've held since very early in my teaching career. Personal enlightenment is the awakening to the absolute or non-relative nature of consciousness itself in the individual. But what I have come to call radical, impersonal, evolutionary enlightenment means that this absolute ground of consciousness itself is no longer just the possession or inner experience of any individual, but becomes the very foundation of and context for human relationship. Enlightenment beyond the personal, liberation beyond the individual, the consciousness of One being shared by the many in a context of multiplicity and relatedness. An enlightened individual is like a burning match, and he or she might be burning very brightly. But a forest fire rages out of control. The fire is the context within which all the trees are burning. What they are sharing is the fire. In evolutionary enlightenment, the individuals are consumed, as the fire of enlightened consciousness itself becomes the context they are relating within. Andrew Cohen November 20, 2005