About eastern philosophy & its diff between western thou

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
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My knowledge concerned the history of Hindu Philosophy is very limited. There are specific teachers and movements and such, but if you lack familiarity with Sanskrit, then it can be difficult to access them. Ancient Hindu names are also not simple for English speakers.

I am most knowledgeable about Vedanta philosophy, which is theistic. Most of the Hindu philosophy that has made it to the West is Vedanta.

I would ask, do you consider the writings of Aquinas to be religion or philosophy? Because I would say Vedanta philosophy is to Hindu religion as Aquinas is to Christian religion.

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I’ve thought about this some more and came up with this distinction: Western philosophy and religion start’s with knowing and knowledge leading to understanding. Eastern philosophy begins with intuitive understanding that may lead to a personal knowing.

Perhaps this explain’s why the western mind has difficulty grasping a philosophy that emphasizes ‘not knowing’. The eastern approach is almost 180 degrees from conventional western thinking.

JT

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But which ever approach you take, should not the common external measure of anything be the truth? For anyone can say anything about knowledge or understanding, even mad men and con men and stupid men. (And maybe now I am beginning to see the ‘goodness’ of fools, lunatics and hustlers.) How do I tell apart sense from nonsense? So Eastern or Western, Northern or Southern, it does not matter, as long as there is some common objective measure that is humanly meaningful and intuitively acceptable of the validity of one thing and not another.

And if someone who have “grasped” a thing cannot explained what was grasped, what should I think of it? Either that which was grasped was not or the one who grasped is dumb. And nothing is added to the pool of human knowledge and understanding at all. It was all futility.

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To me religion is about beliefs and rituals. In some sense Christianity is not a religion, and Science is.

Philosophy is about reasoning, the process of seeking truths, and the justification of what is asserted or derived as such.

So if you just tell me do this and do that and you will get enlightenment, and dont question why, then that’s religion, ie it is any collection of unsubstantiated beliefs and practices. Whether or not such beliefs are consistent within themselves or crongruent with reality are not issues for religion. The more important thing is conformance to practices and rituals.

If you explain to me what is enlightenment, and why it is to be sought, and why such and such a process will lead to it, and justify it as true, and demonstrate that what is thought is systematically consistent and it corresponds to reality, as evidenced by its utility, then it is philosophy.

So the excerpt of Hinduism you have written is religion. It simply asserts what it sees as the world and nature but does not justify why it sees what it sees. Of course we can glean ideas from religion, and assert some as fundamental truths, and then upon it build up a consistent and systematic doctrine of truth, of metaphysics, of knowledge, of understanding, etc. But until then it is not philosophy.

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chanbengchin,

From the western point of view you are correct assuming that there is an external truth, which even in western thinking can’t be assumed.

Eastern thought doesn’t concern itself with representations. It isn’t abouta thing, it is apprehending the thing itself. About is knowing, itself is understanding.

I know, more confusion. I’ll try one more way. Eastern philosophy is about releasing all preconceived ideas and thereby seeing that which is directly. Remove the colored glasses. Western thought relies on very precise definitions and careful logical construction. It works from a complex collection of preconceived ideas to find knowing or knowledge from which, hopefully, comes understanding.

Western thinking is about adding on, eastern philosophy is about stripping away.

Having been raised in western culture and having studied eastern philosophy for many years, I find the differences striking. Both approaches have their strengths, but I must say that eastern philosophy, as difficult as it is, has by far had more impact on my thinking. Or is it my not thinking? I always forget which. :smiley:

JT

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Isnt this a preconceived idea itself?

But that’s not exactly my point, which is how do we tell if Eastern or whatever philosophy is valid? If you say that Eastern philosophy is about a thing, perceiving it, experiencing it directly, so then that’s the measure of truth in that philosophy.

I need not judge what you say on some external, possibly irrelevant measure, but by what you say is meaningful to you or the purpose of what you said. If you say you want to go to a certain place, then I judge according to the fact of you reaching that place, or not. If you tell me this is a tool for hammering nails, then I judged the tool according to what it is claimed to do.

Now so if that philosophy seek for something and it failed to attain that thing, what then do I say?

But if you say you have attained the thing sought for in your philosophy but then you only cannot explained what this is or that you cannot described your experiences of it, how do I know you are not lieing?

For I hold the belief, a preconceived idea if you like, that all humans experiences are common: what you experienced I can experience, and thus it is knowable and communicable to me. The language may be imperfect, but because I experienced the same experienced, I can correlate from the bits and pieces, and suggestion and allusions in your language to be able to understand you, even accurately.

(So does zen has such notions? such as of the validity or reliability of human senses? or of the possibility of language to convey meaning? and what is a lie and what is a truth?)

Further even if I give you the benefit that you have experienced something other-worldly, beyond description and mundane common everyday experiences, then at the least you should be able to tell me what you did to attain that state of “highest awareness”. If again you say you cannot tell me, then I really cannot know whether you are lieing or mad.

Again I think the best judgement of Eastern philosophy (or religion?) is to see its effects on people subscribing to it, and actually having faith in it, ie put to practice what you say you believed (which I do not think is a high proportion, given the senselessness of it all).

So lets look at China, at India. And for zen lets looked at Japan. What it is today is essentially a result of Westernisation. What is the contribution to zen to Japanese society and values and knowledge etc. What about specific individuals? Who are the zen masters - real ones and not fictional ones - and what are their life stories? Well you have studied Eastern philosophy, care to share some stories of these? Or maybe ILP members staying in these countries would like to share what they see in their societies, for good or bad, that can be traced to their philosophical beliefs. Or maybe you just share how has it “impacted” your thinking or “not thinking”. (BTW if the ends of Eastern philosophy is not thinking, then there is no need for it.)

There is wisdom - a intutively agreeable and understandable one - that the tree is known by its fruits.

(And I do not or unable to discern the same quality of ‘intuitive truth’ in Eastern philosophy.)

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In January of this year (2005) Ippolite, replying to Changbengchin, quotes a story about Joshu in which Joshu says “the real way is not difficult, it only abhors choice and attachment.” I’ve been trying to find the source of this quote. I thought it was from The Gateless Gate[i], but couldn’t find it in my copy. Can anyone tell me where this story comes from? Perhaps it’s from the Blue Cliff Record. (Too bad–I don’t have a copy).

I’ve only just found this forum now, in starting to search for the quote. It seems very interesting, but my first impression is that a number of people here are speaking past each other. Nothing new there of course. I’ll have to dig around a bit. Is there a breakdown according to topics? One member made an interesting comment about the ethical side of phenomenology and buddhist thought.

Thank you all; peace of mind and clarity of thought.