World Philosophies

Description

World Philosophies presents in one volume a superb introduction to all the world’s major philosophical and religious traditions. Covering all corners of the globe, Ninian Smart’s work offers a comprehensive and global philosophical and religious picture. In this revised and expanded second edition, a team of distinguished scholars, assembled by the editor Oliver Leaman, have brought Ninian Smart’s masterpiece up to date for the twenty-first century. Chapters have been revised by experts in the field to include recent philosophical developments, and the book includes a new bibliographic guide to resources in world philosophies. A brand new introduction which celebrates the career and writings of Ninian Smart, and his contribution to the study of world religions, helps set the work in context. Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Table of Contents List of revisers Preface Preface to the second edition Introduction to the second edition 1. The history of the world and our philosophical inheritance Some Human Types Representing Philosophy A Sketch of the Wider Meaning of Philosophy Myth, Method and Content Some Conclusions About World Philosophy 2. South Asian philosophies Introduction: The Cultural Area The Buddha’s Time: Its Circumstances The Basic Teaching of the Buddha The Nature and Teachings of the Upanishads The Sāṅkhya System The Schools of Indian Philosophy Jain Philosophy Materialism and Skepticism The Transition to the Classical Period The Rise of the Mahāyāna The School of Representation-Only Hindu Developments: The Gītā and the Brahma Sūtra Śaṅkara and Advaita Vedānta Classical Yoga and Atomism Mīmāṃsā: A Paradoxical Worldview for an Active Priesthood A Summation of the Situation in the Early Middle Ages or Late Classical Period The Viśiştādvaita of Rāmānuja – India’s Most Powerful Theism That Art Not Thou: Madhva’s Dualistic Vedānta Śaiva Variants on the Motifs of Mainstream Vedānta Some Vaiṣṇava Theisms: Vallabha and Caitanya Late Buddhist Developments in India and Tibet Some Themes of the Classical Indian Tradition: Protoscience Indian Epistemology and Logic Themes in Classical India: Realism and Idealism Themes in Classical India: The Concept of the Self Themes in Classical India: The Nature of Ultimate Reality Conclusion and Onward 3. Chinese philosophies Some Key Divisions of History and Thought The Early Period: The Mythic and Cosmological Background The Philosophy of Master Kong The Taoist Alternative: The Mystery of the Way Other Schools of the Early Period: Moists, Logicians and Legalists The Book of Mencius: Another Phase in Confucian Thought Chuang-Tzu (Zhuangzi): A Delightful Sage in the Tradition of the Tao Hsun-Tzu (Xunzi) and the Correction of Human Evil The Foundation of the Han Dynasty and the Increasing Dominance of Rujiao The Classical Period: Two Neo-Taoist Thinkers The Success of Buddhism in Permeating Chinese Culture Beyond the Lotus Sūtra to the Heavenly Terrace Mountain of Chih-K’ai (Zhi Kai) The Huayan – A Characteristically Chinese Way of Looking at Dependence Chan Buddhism – Between Taoist Harmony and Buddhist Idealism Tang Dynasty Buddhism and the Persecution of 845 Confucian Revival: Government, Printing, Cities, Academies, Thought Neoconfucianism or the Learning of Principle The Cheng Brothers and the Idea of Li or Principle Chu Hsi (Zhu Xi), the Great Synthesizer of the Learning of Principle Taoism as a Religion: Meditation, Monasticism, Celestial Hierarchy, Alchemy, Anarchism The Pendulum Swings Again: Wang Yang-Ming (Wang Yangming) in Opposition to the Zhu Xi Tradition After Wang Yangming: A Swing Towards the Practical and Empirical Turning Against Neoconfucian Metaphysics Materialism and Affirmation of Desires The Practical Turn: Ordering the World (Jingshi) Some Themes in the History of Chinese Philosophy 4. Korean philosophies A Sketch of Relevant Korean History Korean Huayan: Uisang and Wŏnhyo The Yi State and the Transformation of Korean Society Yi Yulgok and Some Crucial Debates in the Neoconfucian Tradition Sincerity and the Theory of Knowledge in T’oegye and Yulgok Some Reflections on Korean Thought in the Premodern Period 5. Japanese philosophies An Overview Tendai: Syncretic Buddhism and Original Enlightenment Shingon Buddhism: Esotericism in the Japanese Mode Hōnen and the Pure Land School Shinran: The Jōdo Shinshū and Amida’s Power of Election Nichiren Buddhism: The Primacy of the Lotus Sūtra and the Importance of Japan Another Typical Japanese Motif: Zen Buddhism Dōgen and the Establishment of Sōtō Zen Zen and the Martial and Other Arts Hakuin and the Revival of Rinzai Zen Some Main Shinto Ideas: Kami, Purity, Humanity Attempts at a Synthesis Between Shinto and Confucianism The National Learning School and the Thought of Motoori Norinaga Confucianism in Japan Before the Tokugawa Regime The Tokugawas and the Shushi School The Idealist Alternative to the Shushi School The Ancient Learning School: Cutting Through Commentaries and Accretions A Summation on Japanese Philosophies and Those of East Asia 6. Philosophies of Greece, Rome and the Near East The Significance of the Greek Experience, and of Surrounding Cultures The Ionian School and the Search for a First Arché The Pythagorean School and the Fascination of Numbers Heraclitus, Fire, Flux and Strife Parmenides and his Three Ways: With Some Indian Comparisons Empedocles, the Four Elements and Reincarnation Anaxagoras and the Idea of Mind or Nous: And Beyond to Atomism The Various Theories and their Eastern Counterparts The Sophists: Towards Socrates Plato’s Scheme of Things Early and Middle Platonism Neoplatonism, and the Creation of a Fully Spiritual Platonism Other Neoplatonists, and Some Reflections The Aristotelian Divergence: the Higher Common Sense Other Systems of Greek Thought in the Hellenistic Period Zoroastrianism and its Effects on Judaism and Christianity Mani and the Manichaean Tradition The Development of Christian Thought: The Alignment of Theology and Philosophy Christian Philosophies up to and Beyond Constantine The Trinity Doctrine as Defined at Nicaea A Brief Look at Byzantine Philosophy and Theology Augustine: The Greatest of Latin Christian Writers of the Empire One Other Figure: Pseudo-Dionysius A Conclusion The Continuity of Greek Philosophy: The Concept of Love 7. Islamic philosophies Different Strands in the Intellectual Life of Islam The Emergence and the Challenge of the Mu‘tazilah and the Ash‘arite Synthesis Another Religious Source of Worldviews: The Growth of Sufism Falsafah: Convergences With and Divergences from Revelation The Exponent of a Unified Philosophy: Al-Fārābī (870–950) Ibn Sīnā: A Dominant Islamic Philosopher Al-Ghazālī: The Most Important Intellectual Figure of the Islamic East Al-Ghazālī’s Critique of the Concept of Causation Al-Ghazālī’s Making Sufism Orthodox and Orthodoxy Sufi Philosophy in Spain Ibn Rushd and the Influence of Averroism From Philosophy to Sufism Once Again: Ibn ‘Arabi Some Other Trends in Sufism Ibn Khaldūn: A New Science of Civilizations Reflections on Islamic Philosophy Before the Modern Period 8. Jewish philosophies Jewish Philosophy: Why Treat it Separately? Sa‘Adyah Ben Yosef and Jewish Kalām Jewish Philosophy in the Western (Spanish) Context Ibn Daud and the Jewish Use of Aristotelianism: Maimonides Jewish Averroism and its Criticism Crescas, the Al-Ghazālī of Judaism The Final Chapters Beyond Spain: the End of Medieval Jewish Philosophy The Emergence of a Kabbalistic Worldview Some Conclusions About Jewish Philosophy and Mysticism Recent Developments in the Study of Jewish Philosophy 9. Europe The Emergence of Philosophy in Medieval Christendom John Scotus Eriugena: A Celtic Neoplatonist Anselm of Canterbury and the Ontological Argument After Augustine: Bonaventure Thomas Aquinas and the New Synthesis Duns Scotus and Metaphysics William of Ockham: A Radical Critique of Aristotle and Others Ockham’s Influence The Relation of Mysticism to Philosophy Meister Eckhart and Some Relations to Indian Philosophy Nicholas of Cusa and the Coincidence of Opposites Some Reflections on Medieval Christian Philosophy Marsilio Ficino and the Florentine Academy Pico Della Mirandola and Universalism Cardano and Ambiguities in Renaissance Thought Machiavelli – Looking at Politics with a Cool Eye The Effects of the Reformation Upon Philosophy Science, Philosophy and Religion Descartes: The Transition to a New World Malebranche and Occasionalism Spinoza Takes the Geometrical Method in a Different Direction Thomas Hobbes: From Politics to Philosophy Lord Herbert of Cherbury and Deism Ralph Cudworth and Some Other Cambridge Platonists John Locke: Empiricism and Liberalism Leibniz and the Idea of Universal Harmony Some Ethical Theories in Britain The Progress of British Empiricism, Especially in Berkeley and Hume The French Encyclopédie – Helping the Enlightenment Lessing, Mendelssohn and Others Immanuel Kant and the Critical Philosophy Idealism: Fichte and Schelling on the Road to Hegel Hegel, the Giant of Nineteenth-Century German Philosophy The British Idealists – Green, Bosanquet, Bradley Empiricism and Materialism in the Nineteenth-Century British Tradition Herbert Spencer and Agnosticism From Feuerbach to Marx Other Responses to Hegel – Schopenhauer and Kierkegaard Nietzsche – A Different Kind of Rebel Nineteenth-Century Developments in France An Interlude on Russian Philosophy Solovyev, Berdyaev and Others Russian Marxism: Stalin and the Aftermath Some Developments Affecting Philosophy up to World War I Moore and Russell: Common Sense and Science The Vienna Circle, Logical Positivism and Linguistic Philosophy Two Wittgensteins and their Effect on Linguistic Philosophy Karl Popper: Criticism and the Open Society Some Southern Philosophers: Unamuno, Ortega, Gentile and Croce From Phenomenology to Existentialism: Husserl to Sartre Collingwood and Dilthey The Philosophy of Martin Heidegger and Jean-Paul Sartre Critical Theory in Germany Some Reflections 10. North America North American Worldviews and Values Individualism as a Main Characteristic of American Protestantism Judaism Emerges into the Main Stream The Distinctive Development of American Philosophy Beyond Emerson American Pragmatism: Peirce as the Founder William James and the Development of Truthpragmatism John Dewey: Pragmatism becomes Instrumentalism Some Further Developments in America: Critical Realism and A.N. Whitehead Logical Positivism and Analytic Philosophy in America Reflections on the American Scene 11. Latin America Some General Patterns Inca and Aztec Worldviews The Early and Intermediate Period: Scholasticism The Theories of Ariel Other Resistance to Positivism Some Other Latin American Philosophers of the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century The Background to Liberation Theology Themes in Liberation Theology Reflections on Liberation Theology in Relation to Philosophies Identity and Liberation The Existence of a Characteristically Latin American Philosophy 12. Modern Islam The Decline of the Islamic World and European Domination The Wahhābī Movement in Arabia: Vibrant Fundamentalism The Baha’is: Beyond Islam The Ahmadiyahs: A Version of Practical Modernism Al-Afghani: The Precursor of Islamic Modernism Muhammad 'Abduh: The Primary Exponent of Islamic Modernism Secular Reform: Another Alternative Reform and New Thinking in South Asia Muhammad Iqbal: A Romantic and Bergsonian Worldview Reinforced by Sufism Postmodern Directions in Islamic Countries 13. Modern South and South-east Asia The Impact of Europe on the Region The Brahmo Samaj: A First Attempt to Bridge Two Worlds Dayananda Sarasvati and a Different Reaction to the West A Deeper Synthesis: Ramakrishna and Vivekananda Beyond Vivekananda: Gandhi’s Worldview Sri Aurobindo: A Different Kind of Metaphysics Some Effects of Theosophy Surendranath Dasgupta and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan Other Figures within the Hindu Cultural Domain The Western Impact on Buddhism Some Other Trends in Buddhist South and South-East Asia Some Conclusions About Buddhism 14. China, Korea and Japan in modern times The Western Challenge in the Far East Kang Youwei’s Thought Questions of Modernizing Buddhism Some Further Developments in Confucianism The Philosophy of the Kuomintang: Sun and Chiang The New Culture Movement and Marxism Mao Zedong Thought Chinese Philosophy After Mao’s Death New Confucianism and Late Twentieth-Century Revivals of Confucianism Reflections on the Modern Chinese Intellectual Heritage Notes on Korea The Japanese Response to the West D.T. Suzuki and Comparative Studies Nishida Kitarō and the Kyoto School Reflections on the Philosophies of the Far East 15. African philosophies What is Africa? African Religious Worldviews: Themes Some Classical World-Pictures Bantu, or African, Ontology Patterns of Western Anthropology Negritude and E.W. Blyden Some Other Contributions to Pan-Africanism Beyond Traditional Worldviews: New Movements Kimbanguism New Worldviews in the New World New Theologies Reflections on African Thought 16. Concluding reflections Some Notes on the Global Scene Small-Scale Peoples and Identity Some General Features of Intellectual and Other Changes in the Second Half of the Twentieth Century Some New Directions in Europe Notes on Recent Issues in North American and British Philosophy Reflections on the Relations of Philosophies: Some Conceptual Issues Reflections on Philosophies in the World Order Bibliography Index