The Enlightenment of Suffering V2

Emerson, Eden, and a light in the darkness

Peter Paul Rubens. Jan Brueghel the Elder. The Garden of Eden with the Fall of Man. 1615

The lone road—“To the poet, to the philosopher, to the saint, all things are friendly and sacred, all events are profitable, all days holy, all men divine.” Many would read Emerson’s quote as proof enlightenment is a condition that lies beyond evil and suffering.

I argue the exact opposite.

This quote only mentions their enlightened condition. It does not mention the labor that went into becoming enlightened. The poet, philosopher, and saint share kinship with the warfighter, and this warfighter perspective reveals the depth of this labor: “Things” like guns can kill them and sharks can eat them. “Events” can lead to a leg shot off at the knee by a fifty caliber machine gun. “Days” can be so wretched you wish you could become an ascetic in a cave and live in silent contemplation unto the end of time. “Men” execute women and others torture children—some “men” do both.

If we did not know what suffering and evil were we would have nothing to be enlightened about.

It follows that these two statements are non-contradictory: 1) Evil and suffering are wretched. 2) The lone road leading to enlightenment runs through the valleys of evil and suffering.

Putting utopia to the test—Imagine landing the dream house, the dream spouse, the dream job, or perhaps no job at all, and you are able to enjoy endless leisure. Every wish has been granted and every possession is now yours. Nothing goes wrong here. The threats of nuclear war, pandemics, and illness are no more. You have no need to help those in pain for they can feel no pain. You and your loved one will live forever in this utopia. Not even death can poison the bliss.

In the beginning, it may feel as satisfying as the first few days of a vacation at the beach, the salt-air a tonic for the nerves, skin glowing from the sun. But after a few weeks you might begin to feel an itch… a gnawing tug of discontent. You might find yourself imagining a thief breaking in while you valiantly fight him off, saving yourself and your loved ones. Or you fantasize about a stray dog swept away by a rip tide and rescuing her amid the boulders and crashing waves to the cheering of onlookers. Or you might look to the horizon beyond the sea and wonder what forests and deserts you may find, even if you already know. After years or decades or millennia, you might axe a few trees, weave palm fiber around them, and sail this savage canoe unto the edge of the earth just to feel something.

Without death, evil, suffering, and uncertainty of outcome, only one question remains: what is the point?

Those with fame, wealth, mansions, yachts, cocaine, many-lettered credentials after their names, jets, longevity doctors, power—these are the most miserable sons of bitches ever to walk the earth.

Good thinking material for a walk—Adam and Eve were given paradise in Eden. Wet black soil, purple-tinged figs, rose-red pomegranates glistening in the golden sunrise, innocence and peace and plenty. They could not handle paradise—not even God could handle man living in paradise.

Enlightenment of suffering—If suffering were not essential to human life, why is it to be found in war and peace, wealth and poverty, in pre-state and state, in health and when stabbed, shot, or sick? Why has suffering not been eliminated with drugs or sobriety, mansions or caves, love or hate, communes or solitary confinement?

Those poets, philosophers, and saints who sought to transcend suffering through enlightenment must have suffered beyond comprehension. Only those who sought enlightenment through their suffering saw their time on this earth as sacred, profitable, holy, and divine.

Tahitian youths were taught a song in the house of horrors that was pre-state island life:

This club is red,

Become subduers,

Become fast runners;

That darkness be out,

That the light be let in.¹

The warfighter free-falling fifteen thousand feet above the sea on a moonless night to assault a ship of zealots is letting a light in. A poet can feel ten times the pain of a mere mortal within her soul, and yet she inks a haiku on the black and golden wings of a butterfly and it gives her and those who read it a reason to live. A philosopher traces every demonic thread of humanity down to its most bloody and sadistic roots—and only then can put words to the thread of love and self-sacrifice that runs back up to the surface. Long and many are the roads to Golgotha, and the saint has learned to find enlightenment in every weary step.

Spreading our arms to the full spectrum of human experience—To have known the fullest suffering life can bring, to have witnessed evil at its blackest root, and then to grind and bring a bit of light to the darkness—that is enlightenment.

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1. Oliver, Douglas L. Ancient Tahitian Society. University of Hawai’i Press, 1974.

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