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enlightening has 3 distinct synonyms spread across 2 of its 2 senses. Each sense below keeps its own list, because a synonym belongs to a meaning and not to a word: swapping one sense's substitute into another sense's sentence is how a thesaurus makes writing worse. Its one recorded opposite is unenlightening.
Counts are distinct word forms across every sense. A synonym that appears under three senses is counted once here and shown three times below, under each sense it belongs to.
tending to increase knowledge or dissipate ignorance
“an enlightening glimpse of government in action”
enlightening or uplifting so as to encourage intellectual or moral improvement
“the paintings in the church served an edifying purpose even for those who could not read”
Synonyms, antonyms and the broader and narrower relations for enlightening come from Princeton University’s WordNet. Full sources and licences.