Eastern philosophy

In the West, the term Eastern philosophy refers very broadly to the various philosophies of "the East,", including Iran, China, India, Japan, and the general area.

Differences from Western philosophy

Arguments against the "Eastern philosophy" designation

Some have argued that the distinction between Eastern and Western philosophies is arbitrary and purely geographic, that this artificial distinction does not take into account the tremendous amount of interaction between Eastern and Western thought, and that the distinction is more misleading than enlightening. Furthermore, it has been argued that the term Eastern philosophy implies similarities between philosophical schools which may not exist and obscures the differences between Eastern philosophies.

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One such argument is historical. Our first "historical glimpse" of Western philosophy actually takes us to Asia Minor. Whether its roots lie in India (or the roots of Indian philosophy stem from an Indo-Aryan invasion) we may never know. But it is surely plausible that the Middle East was a crossroads of ancient religious philosophical systems.

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A related argument is linguistic, based on the classification of Sanskrit as one of the earliest Indo-European languages. (Nietzsche famously argued that Christianity and Buddhism were "kindred" religions.)

Related Topics:
Sanskrit - Indo-European language

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The central conceptual structure shared with Classical Western philosophy (and lacking in East Asian thought prior to the Buddhist "invasion") includes counterparts of the dichotomies between reason v emotion, appearance v reality, one v many, and permanence v change. Indian and Western thought, with their robust mind-body conceptual dualism, share consequent tendencies to subjective idealism or dualism. Formally, they share the rudiments of Western "folk psychology" --a sentential psychology and semantics e.g. belief and (propositional) knowledge, subject-predicate grammar (and subject-object metaphysics) truth and falsity, and inference. These concepts underwrote the emergence (or perhaps spread) of logic in Greece and India (In contrast to pre-Buddhist China). Other noticeable similarities include structural features of related concepts of time, space, objecthood and causation -- all concepts hard to isolate within ancient Chinese conceptual space.

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One fundamental reason for the separation is that both traditions of Eastern philosophy tend to be marginalized or ignored in Western studies of the "history of philosophy." So both tend to be relegated to the World Religions departments of Western universities, or to New Age nonacademic works, though there are several notable exceptions.

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The perception of God and the gods

Because of the influence of monotheism and especially the Abrahamic religions, Western philosophies have been faced with the question of the nature of God and His relationship to the universe. This has created a dichotomy among Western philosophies between secular philosophies and religious philosophies which develop within the context of a particular monotheistic religion's dogma regarding the nature of God and the universe.

Related Topics:
Abrahamic religions - Dogma

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Eastern philosophies have not been as concerned by questions relating to the nature of a single God as the universe's sole creator and ruler. The distinction between the religious and the secular tends to be much less sharp in Eastern philosophy, and the same philosophical school often contains both religious and philosophical elements. Thus, some people accept the metaphysical tenets of Buddhism without going to a temple and worshipping. Some have worshipped the Taoist deities religiously without bothering to delve into the philosophic underpinnings, while others embrace Taoist philosophy while ignoring the religious aspects.

Related Topics:
Metaphysical - Buddhism - Taoist

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This arrangement stands in marked contrast to most philosophy of the West, which has traditionally enforced either a completely unified philosophic/religious belief system (e.g. the various sects and associated philosophies of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam), or a sharp and total repudiation of religion by philosophy (e.g. Nietzsche, Marx, Voltaire, etc.) The distinction between religion and philosophy is not so important in the East.

Related Topics:
Christianity - Judaism - Islam - Nietzsche - Marx - Voltaire

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Gods' relationship with the universe

Another common thread that often differentiates Eastern philosophy from Western is the belief regarding the relationship between God or the gods and the universe. Western philosophies typically either disavow the existence of God, or else hold that God or the gods are something separate and distinct from the universe. This comes from the influence of the Abrahamic religions, which teach that this universe was created by a single all-powerful God who existed before and separately from this universe. The true nature of this God is incomprehensible to us, his creations.

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Eastern philosophic traditions generally tend to be less concerned with the existence or non-existence of gods. Although some Eastern traditions have supernatural spiritual beings and even powerful gods, these are generally not seen as separate from the universe, but rather as a part of the universe. Conversely, most Eastern religions teach that ordinary actions can affect the supernatural realm.

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The role and nature of the individual

It has been argued that in most Western philosophies, the same can be said of the individual: Western philosophies generally assume as a given that the individual is something different from the universe, and Western philosophies attempt to describe and categorize the universe from a detached, objective viewpoint. Eastern philosophies, on the other hand, typically hold that people are an intrinsic and inseparable part of the universe, and that attempts to discuss the universe from an objective viewpoint as though the individual speaking was something separate and detached from the whole are inherently absurd.

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