Buddhist Philosophy as Philosophy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Siderits
Keyword(s):  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Philosophical Inquiry ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Potential Benefits ◽  
Academic Philosophy ◽  
Buddhist Teaching ◽  
Philosophical Texts ◽  
Current Resistance

Is Buddhist philosophy properly thought of as philosophy? The work of Buddhist thinkers such as Vasubandhu, Nāgārjuna, and Dharmakīrti is widely recognized as deploying the same sorts of tools to investigate the same sorts of topics as what one finds in the practices of academic philosophers in the early 21st century. Still there is resistance to incorporating Buddhist philosophical texts into the philosophy canon, and this both from “mainstream” academic philosophers and from Buddhologists (scholars of the Buddhist tradition). Current resistance can be traced to concerns over the soteriological context of Buddhist philosophizing. Those who wish to maintain the present Eurocentric focus of the philosophy canon suspect that the soteriological ends to which philosophical inquiry is put by Buddhists must compromise philosophy’s commitment to rationality and Buddhism’s commitment to its goal of salvation. Resistance from both sides thus presupposes that a spiritual practice necessarily involves commitments that are not rationally assessable. And this presupposition may be incompatible with the core Buddhist teaching of non-self. If this clears the way to including the Buddhist philosophical tradition in the canon, one must ask how this may affect the two parties to the project of fusion. A brief look at some recent missteps reveals that only if there is greater teamwork between philologically trained Buddhologists and scholars trained in (what currently counts as) “mainstream” academic philosophy can there be real progress. But the potential benefits—for both sides—may well justify the effort.

scholarly journals FILOSOFIJA LIETUVOJE PO 1989: KĄ APIE TAI BYLOJA LIETUVIŠKI AKADEMINIAI ŽURNALAI?

Problemos ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 78 ◽  
pp. 7-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aldis Gedutis
Keyword(s):  
Citation Index ◽  
Communication Strategies ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Academic Journals ◽  
Major Objective ◽  
Philosophical School ◽  
Academic Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Texts

Straipsnyje nagrinėjama Lietuvos filosofijos būklė po 1989 metų. Pagrindinis dėmesys skiriamas klausimui, ar po 1989 metų Lietuvoje atsirado filosofinė (s) tradicija (-os) bei mokykla (-os). Tyrimo objektas – lietuviški akademiniai žurnalai – „Problemos“, „Filosofija. Sociologija“ ir „Logos“. Chronologinė aprėptis –straipsniai, publikuoti nuo 1989 iki 2009 metų. Siekiama išnagrinėti lietuvių filosofų citavimo ir tarpusavio komunikavimo strategijas, esant galimybei ieškoti kriterijų, leidžiančių identifikuoti filosofinės tradicijos buvimą. Pagrindinis dėmesys skiriamas šiems klausimams: kaip dažnai ir kokiu būdu lietuvių filosofai cituoja ir mini savo kolegas? ar citavimas ir kolegų (pa)minėjimas leidžia identifikuoti tradicijai būdingus santykius tarp Lietuvos filosofų? kurie lietuvių filosofai ir filosofiniai tekstai yra įtakingiausi ir dažniausiai naudojami? 1Pagrindiniai žodžiai: Lietuvos filosofija, filosofinė tradicija, filosofinė mokykla, citavimo indeksas, komunikacija filosofijoje.Philosophy in Lithuania after 1989: What do Lithuanian Academic Journals Reveal?Aldis Gedutis SummaryIn this study, the condition of Lithuanian philosophy after 1989 was analyzed. The attention is focused on the question whether any philosophical tradition(s) and/or school(s) have originated during the last 20 years. The object of the research was Lithuanian academic philosophical journals: Problemos, Filosofija.Sociologija and Logos. The chronological scope: articles published during the period 1989–2009. The major objective of the inquiry is to reveal and figure out citation and communication strategies in the discourse of Lithuanian academic philosophy and to identify the existence of philosophical tradition(school), if any. The major concern can be summarized by the following questions: what is the frequency of the colleagues’ citation? Are Lithuanian philosophers’ citation strategies sufficient to claim the fact of the existence of Lithuanian philosophical tradition (school)? What are the most influential Lithuanian philosophers and philosophical texts?Keywords: Lithuanian philosophy, philosophical tradition, philosophical school, citation index, communication in philosophy.

The Problem of the Formation of Philosophical Prose in Persian

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (6) ◽  
pp. 126-137
Author(s):  
Tatyana G. Korneeva
Keyword(s):  
Arabic Language ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Alternative View ◽  
Ibn Sina ◽  
Language Of Science ◽  
Persian Language ◽  
Arab Muslim ◽  
History Of ◽  
Philosophical Texts

The article discusses the problem of the formation of philosophical prose in the Persian language. The first section presents a brief excursion into the history of philosophical prose in Persian and the stages of formation of modern Persian as a language of science and philosophy. In the Arab-Muslim philosophical tradition, representatives of various schools and trends contributed to the development of philosophical terminology in Farsi. The author dwells on the works of such philosophers as Ibn Sīnā, Nāṣir Khusraw, Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī, Aḥmad al-Ghazālī, ʼAbū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī and gives an overview of their works written in Persian. The second section poses the question whether the Persian language proved able to compete with the Arabic language in the field of science. The author examines the style of philosophical prose in Farsi, considering the causes of creation of Persian-language philosophical texts and defining their target audience. The article presents viewpoints of modern orientalist researchers as well as the views of medieval philosophers who wrote in Persian. We find that most philosophical texts in Persian were written for a public who had little or no knowledge of the Arabic language, yet wanted to get acquainted with current philosophical and religious doctrines, albeit in an abbreviated format. The conclusion summarizes and presents two positions regarding the necessity of writing philosophical prose in Persian. According to one point of view, Persian-language philosophical works helped people who did not speak Arabic to get acquainted with the concepts and views of contemporary philosophy. According to an alternative view, there was no special need to compose philosophical texts in Persian, because the corpus of Arabic philosophical terminology had already been formed, and these Arabic terms were widely and successfully used, while the new Persian philosophical vocabulary was difficult to understand.

Masterly Maxims

PMLA ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 129 (3) ◽  
pp. 491-497
Author(s):  
Mieke Bal
Keyword(s):  
Postcolonial Theory ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
Teaching English ◽  
Deep Knowledge ◽  
Philosophical Background ◽  
Philosophical Texts ◽  
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak

Unlike most others teaching (English) literature, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak is intimately knowledgeable about philosophy, especially German. Her deep knowledge of Kant, Marx, and Gramsci is a red thread running through her many books. And, given her interest in what we call less and less happily “postcolonial” theory (the hesitation coming from an awareness of the problematic meaning of the prefix post-), her discussions of such canonical and inexhaustible philosophical texts never lose sight of the sociopolitical implications of the ideas gleaned from the encounter. Thus, she brings a philosophical tradition to bear on contemporary social issues of a keen actuality. This solid philosophical background does not make her texts always easy to read for literary and other cultural scholars eager to get ideas—preferably quickly—about “how to do” postcolonial literary studies. Spivak's work is as challenging to read, understand, and absorb as it is important in content.

Buddhist philosophy, Japanese

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John C. Maraldo
Keyword(s):  
Political Institutions ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Japanese Culture ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Cultural Complex ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Japanese Buddhism ◽  
Confucian Philosophy ◽  
To Come

Buddhism transformed Japanese culture and in turn was transformed in Japan. Mahāyāna Buddhist thought entered Japan from the East Asian continent as part of a cultural complex that included written language, political institutions, formal iconography and Confucian literature. From its introduction in the sixth century through to the sixteenth century, Japanese Buddhism developed largely by incorporating Chinese Buddhism, accommodating indigenous beliefs and reconciling intersectarian disputes. During the isolationist Tokugawa Period (1600–1868), neo-Confucian philosophy and Dutch science challenged the virtual hegemony of Buddhist ways of thinking, but served more often as alternative and sometimes complementary models than as incompatible paradigms. Only since the reopening of Japan in 1868 has Japanese Buddhist thought seriously attempted to come to terms with early Indian Buddhism, Western thought and Christianity. Through the centuries, Buddhism gave the Japanese people a way to make sense of life and death, to explain the world and to seek liberation from suffering. When it engaged in theorizing, it did so in pursuit of religious fulfilment rather than of knowledge for its own sake. As an extension of its practical bent, Japanese Buddhist thought often tended to collapse differences between Buddhism and other forms of Japanese religiosity, between this phenomenal world and any absolute realm, and between the means and end of enlightenment. These tendencies are not Japanese in origin, but they extended further in Japan than in other Buddhist countries and partially define the character of Japanese Buddhist philosophy. In fact, the identity of ‘Japanese Buddhist philosophy’ blends with almost everything with which we would contrast it. As a development and modification of Chinese traditions, there is no one thing that is uniquely Japanese about it; as a Buddhist tradition, it is characteristically syncretistic, often assimilating Shintō and Confucian philosophy in both its doctrines and practices. Rituals, social practices, political institutions and artistic or literary expressions are as essential as philosophical ideas to Japanese Buddhism. Disputes about ideas often arose but were seldom settled by force of logical argument. One reason for this is that language was used not predominately in the service of logic but for the direct expression and actualization of reality. Disputants appealed to the authority of Buddhist sūtras because these scriptures were thought to manifest a direct understanding of reality. Further, as reality was thought to be all-inclusive, the better position in the dispute would be that which was more comprehensive rather than that which was more consistent but exclusive. Politics and practical consequences did play a role in the settling of disputes, but the ideal of harmony or conformity often prevailed. The development of Japanese Buddhist philosophy can thus be seen as the unfolding of major themes rather than a series of philosophical positions in dispute. These themes include the role of language in expressing truth; the non-dual nature of absolute and relative, universal and particular; the actualization of liberation in this world, life or body; the equality of beings; and the transcendent non-duality of good and evil.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jin Y. Park
Keyword(s):  
Lived Experience ◽  
Gender Discrimination ◽  
Fundamental Question ◽  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Secular World ◽  
Buddhist Teaching

HOW AND WHY DO women engage with Buddhism? This is the fundamental question that Women and Buddhist Philosophy: Engaging Zen Master Kim Iryŏp proposes to answer through discussions of Kim Iryŏp’s (金一葉‎ 1896–1971) life and philosophy. With her Christian background and feminist activist perspective, Kim Iryŏp offers a creative interpretation of how Buddhism as a philosophy and a religion can engage with lived experience. Her awareness of gender discrimination, suffering, and discontent in the secular world led Iryŏp to explore the Buddhist teaching of absolute equality, which conceives of individuals as free beings with infinite capability. She also employs Buddhism to answer existential questions regarding the scope of an individual’s identity, the meaning of being human, and the ultimate value of existence. Moving beyond current Buddhist scholarship on gender, ...

Chinul (1158–1210)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Buswell
Keyword(s):  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Korean Buddhism ◽  
The Mind

Chinul was the founder of the Korean Chogye school of Buddhism. He sought to reconcile the bifurcation between Kyo (doctrinal) thought and Sôn (Zen) practice that rent the Korean Buddhist tradition of his time, by showing the symbiotic connection between Buddhist philosophy and meditation. He also advocated a distinctive program of soteriology that became emblematic of Korean Buddhism from that time forward: an initial sudden awakening to the nature of the mind followed by gradual cultivation of that awakening until full enlightenment was achieved.

Sa skya Paṇḍita (1182–1251)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georges B.J. Dreyfus
Keyword(s):  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Main Obstacle ◽  
Crucial Element ◽  
Types Of Knowledge ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Summum Bonum ◽  
Philosophical Importance ◽  
Sa Skya Paṇḍita ◽  
Individual Objects ◽  
Sa Skya

The philosophical importance of Sa skya Paṇḍita (Sagya Paṇḍita) lies in his clarification of the tradition of logic and epistemology established by Dharmakīrti. He actively promoted the study of Dharmakīrti’s thought in Tibet as a propaedeutic to the study of other systems of Buddhist philosophy as well as to a Buddhist account of knowledge; knowledge is a crucial element in the Buddhist tradition, for ignorance is considered the main obstacle to liberation, the summum bonum of the tradition. Like Dharmakīrti, Sa skya Paṇḍita held that the only two types of knowledge are perception and inference. Perception presents us with real individual objects, while inference enables us to consider these individuals in a conceptual way, in terms of universals; however, it is a mistake to regard these universals as real.

Neoplatonism in Late Antiquity

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dmitri Nikulin
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Ancient Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Philosophical Study ◽  
Philosophical Thought ◽  
Philosophical Texts ◽  
The Many ◽  
The One

This book is a philosophical study of two major thinkers who span the period of late antiquity. While Plotinus stands at the beginning of its philosophical tradition, setting the themes for debate and establishing strategies of argument and interpretation, Proclus falls closer to its end, developing a grand synthesis of late ancient thought. The book discusses many central topics of philosophy and science in Plotinus and Proclus, such as the one and the many; number and being; the individuation and constitution of the soul, imagination, and cognition; the constitution of number and geometrical objects; indivisibility and continuity; intelligible and bodily matter; and evil. It shows that late ancient philosophy did not simply embrace and borrow from the major philosophical traditions of earlier antiquity—Platonism, Aristotelianism, Stoicism—by providing marginal comments on widely known philosophical texts. Rather, Neoplatonism offered a set of highly original and innovative insights into the nature of being and thought, which can be distinguished in much subsequent philosophical thought up until modernity.

Scenes of Inclination

2021 ◽  
pp. 33-45
Author(s):  
Adriana Cavarero
Keyword(s):  
Female Body ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Care Giver ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Male Individual ◽  
Philosophical Texts ◽  
Distinctive Role

Cavarero’s ethic of inclination responds to a postural geometric imaginary in the philosophical tradition that is irrefutably gendered. Opening with a reflection on the character of Irina in Italo Calvino’s ‘If, on a winter’s night, a traveller’ she draws out the inclined, sinuous, curving figures of the female common to literary and philosophical texts, and contrasts them to the straight, upright, correct and erect, male figure. Tracing these stereotypes back to Ancient Greek etymology, she charts its progress through the work of Plato, Kant, and Proudhon. From the devalued imagery of the female body as maternal, Cavarero begins her subversion of the philosophical tradition. Following Arendt’s valorisation of the natal scene, Cavarero emphasises the distinctive role of the inclined mother as care giver. This image of inclined motherhood is to form the basis then, of Cavarero’s ethic of inclination—an altruistic ethic that upends the ‘imagined wholeness’ of the dominant liberal model of the independent, self-sufficient male, individual.

scholarly journals Zen, Erfahrung und Philosophie: Ueda Shizuteru und die Schöpfung einer Zen-Philosophie

2015 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gereon Kopf
Keyword(s):  
English Language ◽  
Zen Buddhism ◽  
Early 20Th Century ◽  
Kyoto School ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Academic Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Project ◽  
The One ◽  
Zen Buddhist

AbstractThe philosophers of the so-called Kyoto school famously synthesized Zen Buddhist thought and the academic philosophy of 19th and early 20th century Europe in their work. Shizuteru Ueda, one of disciples of Nishitani, developed a model to categorize three different types of Zen discourse. However, in the English language literature “Zen” is frequently essentialized as “mystical” and as at odds with the philosophical project. Such a misconception not only does injustice to the diverse and vibrant traditions of Zen Buddhism, it also belittles the contributions many of their members have made to the philosophical discourse in general. This essay will introduce Ueda’s model to present one of way of imagining “Zen philosophy” and to investigate how the project of philosophy in general can be understood from within the Japanese Zen Buddhist tradition. It will argue that since philosophy is not a matter of ideology but one of method, “doing philosophy within the Zen tradition” requires a translation of the Zen idiom. It will further demonstrate how Ueda identifies sources for and methods of philosophy within the Zen Buddhist traditions. The goal of this essay is to better understand the philosophical projects of one member of the Kyoto school, on the one side, and to envision a notion of “philosophy” that is relevant for the age of globalism and multiculturalism, on the other.

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