Prior thinks that Edwards' argument depends on a metaphysical turn of phrase. Edwards, he says, subsumes "all happenings, or anyhow... all changes, under the idea of the 'beginning to be' either of concrete objects or of abstract ones". We are not to say, "My head began to ache," we are to say, "My headache began to exist." The shift may seem trivial, but actually it is "of the very first importance": Edwards' argument "depends on it." The reason is the following. (...) Edwards says that objects or substances cannot begin to be without a cause; that if they could, it would be prima facie implausible to hold that substances of only one kind, of all the millions of kinds of substance, should causelessly come to be; and that the implausibility cannot be removed by appealing to the nature of what thus comes to be, because until it actually exists there is nothing there to explain anything. Prior agrees with all that. But he holds that it is not impossible that some already existing substances should have a special kind of property which would make it possible for them to change or act causelessly. Of course, if we have to say that a change or an act is just another kind of coming to be of a substance, this too is impossible. Hence Prior thinks that by showing that changes and acts need not be construed as Edwards construes them, he will have made room for the possibility of limited indeterminism. (shrink)

This review essay assesses the significance of J. B. Schneewind's "The Invention of Autonomy" for the history of moral thought in general and for religious ethics in particular. The essay offers an overview of Schneewind's complex argument before critically discussing his four central themes: the primacy of Immanuel Kant, the fundamentality of conflict, the insufficiency of virtue, and community with God. Whereas Schneewind argues that an impasse between modern natural law and perfectionist ethics revealed irresolvable tensions (...) within Christian ethics and thus encouraged the emergence of secular moral thought, this author suggests that these tensions were specific to a voluntarist strand of Christian moral thought from which even antivoluntarists of the modern period were unable to break free. (shrink)

Kantian autonomy is often thought to be independent of time and place, but J. B. Schneewind in his landmark study, The Invention of Autonomy, has shown that there is much to be learned by setting Kant's moral philosophy in the context of the history of modern moral philosophy. The distinguished authors in the collection continue Schneewind's project by relating Kant's work to the historical context of his predecessors and to the empirical context of human agency. This will be (...) a valuable resource for professionals and advanced students in philosophy, the history of ideas, and the history of political thought. (shrink)

A fine collection of articles on J. S. Mill. One outstanding virtue of this collection is that it doesn't restrict itself to the "standard" topics that are normally associated with Mill. In addition to articles dealing with Mill's logic and utilitarianism, there are articles dealing with Mill's theory of poetry, democracy, and authority. Also included are several selections that vividly portray the flavor and versatility of Mill. In his introduction, Schneewind makes a brief but forceful case for the need (...) to understand Mill in his many facets as a most eminent philosopher and Victorian man of letters.--R. J. B. (shrink)

In the paper I offer a brief sketch of one of the sources of utilitarianism. Our biological ancestry is a matter of fact that is not altered by the way we describe ourselves. With philosophical theories it is otherwise. Utilitarianism can be described in ways that make it look as if it is as old as moral philosophy – as J. S. Mill thought it was. For my historical purposes, it is more useful to have an account that brings out (...) what is specific about Benthamism and its descendants. Let us try to make do with the following. First, utilitarianism asserts that the fundamental requirement of morality is that we are to maximize good, for everyone and not just for the agent. This basic principle presupposes that it makes sense to think of aggregating goods to make a total, and of comparing amounts of good thus aggregated. Second, the good to be brought about is located in feelings of pleasure, and the evil to be avoided in feelings of pain. These feelings have inherent value or disvalue regardless of how they are caused to exist and regardless of their own consequences. Third, all moral principles can be derived from the requirement that good be maximized. The principles involved in evaluating agents as well as in giving moral direction to action are nothing but applications of the basic principle. (shrink)

J. B. Schneewind's "The Invention of Autonomy" has been hailed as a major interpretation of modern moral thought. Schneewind's narrative, however, elides several serious interpretive issues, particularly in the transition from late medieval to early modern thought. This results in potentially distorted accounts of Thomas Aquinas, Hugo Grotius, and G. W. Leibniz. Since these thinkers play a crucial role in Schneewind's argument, uncertainty over their work calls into question at least some of Schneewind's larger agenda for (...) the history of ethics. (shrink)

This is a critical review of J. B. Schneewind's Essays on the History of Moral Philosophy.

J. B. Schneewind's "The Invention of Autonomy" has been hailed as a major interpretation of modern moral thought. Schneewind's narrative, however, elides several serious interpretive issues, particularly in the transition from late medieval to early modern thought. This results in potentially distorted accounts of Thomas Aquinas, Hugo Grotius, and G. W. Leibniz. Since these thinkers play a crucial role in Schneewind's argument, uncertainty over their work calls into question at least some of Schneewind's larger agenda for (...) the history of ethics. (shrink)

This work contains three essays which were delivered at a Symposium in 1966 at the Free University in Brussels, convened to pay homage to Martin Buber. The first essay, by Gabriel Marcel, attempts to edify the reader on Buber's philosophical anthropology, his philosophy of dialogue, political philosophy, and his philosophy of religion. There are frequent comparisons between Marcel's point of view and Buber's. The essay is particularly strong where Marcel analyzes Buber's notion of the "we." His perceptive examination of this (...) subject points up the affinity between his own and the Jewish philosopher's thought. The essay by Emmanuel Levinas, "La Pensée de Martin Buber et le Judaïsme Contemporain," sketches current Jewish thought and finds that it was Buber who gave it direction. Levinas provides also an account of the enormous work which Buber did in establishing Hassidism as an important stage in Hebraic thought. The last essay, by André Lacocque, deals with Protestant theology and the possible application of Buber's ideas to it. There is an extended comparison between the views of Kierkegaard and those of Buber on man's relationship with God and the author concludes that Buber's point of view is more compatible with modern Christianity than was Kierkegaard's.--S. J. B. (shrink)

A splendid edition. Schneewind's illuminating introduction succinctly situates the _Enquiry_ in its historical context, clarifying its relationship to Calvinism, to Newtonian science, and to earlier moral philosophers, and providing a persuasive account of Hume's ethical naturalism. --Martha C. Nussbaum, Brown University.

This little volume, using a combined approach of phenomenology, history, philosophy, and theology probes deeply into questions of belief and commitment. The book is valuable for scholars who possess the background and sensitivity to appreciate the three essays which constitute it. The first of these, "The Structure of Jewish Experience," takes up the epistemological problem of belief in a God who is present in history and who can consequently be the object of worship by modern man just as he was (...) thousands of years ago. The second essay, "The Challenge of Modern Secularity," deals with current theological issues, including the Subjectivist Reductionism, the "Death" of God, and faith as "immediacy after reflection." The third and most impassioned essay, "The Commanding Voice of Auschwitz," deals with themes which have been the preoccupation of Elie Wiesel, to whom the book is dedicated. There have not been many Jewish writers since the holocaust, who have been willing to write about their faith. Fackenheim speculates that it must be difficult to justify such faith to oneself in light of the fate of the Jews in recent history. In this book, and particularly in the last essay, the author attempts to justify such faith, and he does it intelligently and eloquently.--S. J. B. (shrink)

In the Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals Kant presented a method for discovering what morality requires us to do in any situation and claimed that it is a method everyone can use. The method consists in testing one's maxim against the requirement stated in the formulations of the categorical imperative. There has been endless discussion of the adequacy of Kant's method in giving moral guidance, but there has been little effort to situate Kant's view of ethical method in its (...) historical context. In this paper I try to do so. I take the label "method of ethics" from the work of Henry Sidgwick. A method of ethics, he says, is any rational procedure by which we determine what it is right for an individual to do or what an individual ought to do. Since the moralists I want to consider do not all think of morality as rational, I shall broaden the notion by saying that a method is any systematic or regular procedure, rational or not, by which we determine what morality requires... (shrink)

Theory. Moral knowledge and moral principles -- Victorian Matters. First principles and common-sense morality in Sidgwick's ethics ; Moral problems and moral philosophy in the Victorian Period -- On the historiography of moral philosophy. Moral crisis and the history of ethics ; Modern moral philosophy : from beginning to end? : No discipline, no history : the case of moral philosophy ; Teaching the history of moral philosophy -- Seventeenth- and eighteenth-century moral philosophy. The divine corporation and the history of (...) ethics ; Natural law ; The misfortunes of virtue ; Voluntarism and the foundations of ethics ; Hume and the religious significance of moral rationalism -- On Kant. Why study Kant's Groundwork ; Autonomy, obligation, and virtue : an overview of Kant's moral philosophy ; Kant and Stoic ethics ; Toward enlightenment : Kant and the sources of darkness ; Kantian unsocial sociability : good out of evil -- Moral psychology. The active powers -- Afterword. Sixty years of philosophy in a life. (shrink)

An important contribution both to the philosophical literature concerned with the problem of free choice and to the growing field of investigation dealing with self-referential argumentation. The authors have attempted to weave these two areas of interest together, in the hope of advancing philosophical knowledge in both. The book’s approach to the problem of free choice by means of self-referential argumentation will constitute a milestone for future efforts which have this double, or either special, focus.

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries rationalism about morality was repeatedly used to reject strong divine command theories of ethics. Such theories were morally unacceptable to many devout Christians. But deism, rationalist through and through, seemed to make revelation unnecessary, and with it most of Christianity. William Law, an influential divine command theorist of Hume's time, argued that Christians must consequently find rationalism unacceptable. Hume's effort to destroy moral rationalism functions to force his readers into a dilemma: either a morally (...) horrifying divine command view of morals, or almost no religion at all. (shrink)

Sidgwick is usually considered to be a utilitarian, and with good reason. In an autobiographical fragment he tells us that his “first adhesion to a definite Ethical system was to the Utilitarianism of Mill”, and that after a variety of intellectual changes he became “a Utilitarian again, but on an Intuitional basis.” He refers to himself in other works and in letters as a utilitarian, and he was so viewed by his contemporaries. Hence it is understandable that Albee should view (...) The Methods of Ethics as “an independent contribution to the literature of Utilitarianism”, labelling it “the last authoritative utterance of traditional Utilitarianism”, and that almost everyone who discusses the book should agree with this classification of it. Yet Sidgwick did not himself say that the Methods is a defense or a restatement of utilitarianism. On the contrary: he was from the first at pains to disavow any intention of proving a system of morality and to insist that he is presenting only an examination of “the different methods of obtaining reasoned convictions as to what ought to be done which are to be found … in the moral consciousness of mankind generally.” In the “Preface” to the second edition he bemoans the misunderstanding which led critics to suppose that he was “writing as an assailant of two of the methods” he examines. One critic, he complains, thought he was giving “mere hostile criticism” of intuitionism, another “has constructed an article on the supposition that my principal object is ‘the suppression of Egoism’”. Yet a third critic, he remarks dryly, referring to a savage attack by F. H. Bradley, “has gone to the length of a pamphlet under the impression that the ‘main argument’ of my treatise is a demonstration of Universalistic Hedonism. I am concerned”, he comments, “to have caused so much misdirection of criticism”; and he goes on to reiterate his position about the two forms, egoistic and universalistic, of hedonism: “I do not hold the reasonableness of aiming at happiness generally with any stronger conviction than I do that of aiming at one’s own.”. (shrink)

Adams 's suggestion that there must be one really right way of presenting the history of moral philosophy seems implausible to me, so I reject – with additional reasons – his charges against the structure of Invention of Autonomy. Skorupski's way of stating the ‘equal moral abilities’ thesis is not, I argue, very Kantian; a more Kantian version is not open to his objections. I am unconvinced by Schultz's claim that Sidgwick did not really hold that thesis. Deigh raises questions (...) I cannot reply to here, but I do offer some texts that seem to show that Sidgwick is not guilty of the confusion about ‘ought’ with which Deigh charges him. Correspondence:c1 jbs1@jhu.edu. (shrink)

Now it is tempting to try to generalize the view that means-ends considerations play a part in determining what is the right theory. It is tempting, that is, to try to use a similar view to give an account of the nature of truth or knowledge quite generally. For can we not say that truth is simply what we ought to believe, and that knowledge is what we are justified in believing? After all, terms like "true," "false," "probable," "doubtful," "known," (...) "believed," and so on, are not merely descriptive terms. They are used to evaluate the degree to which a belief or proposition is one which we ought to accept. And if in the case of so important an area of human knowledge as scientific theory what we ought to accept is determined in large part by means-ends considerations, may it not be true that in other areas of human knowledge means-ends considerations have a similar function? Perhaps it would even be possible to define truth, or knowledge, in terms of what serves some end or purpose. (shrink)

The first volumes of the great University of Toronto Press edition of the works of John Stuart Mill, edited by John M. Robson, appeared in 1963, and the edition was completed in 1991. Not surprisingly, it has generated a great deal of discussion of Mill's thought. The bibliography in John Skorupski's Companion to Mill lists some 350 items pertinent to Mill published since 1963, although it makes no attempt at comprehensive coverage of English-language studies and has nothing in any foreign (...) language. No one can keep up with all of this secondary material. It is not the least of the virtues of the Companion that it gives us a broad survey of much of the recent research and thought about Mill. I suspect that some of the articles will not be very helpful to bewildered undergraduates hoping for a boost on an assignment. But all of them will be useful to advanced students and scholars who want to know where we are on Mill these days. (shrink)

In this wide-ranging, richly detailed, and philosophically provocative volume, Annas presents not a history of ancient ethics but a study of "the form and structure of ancient ethical theory". Ignoring Plato and his predecessors almost entirely, and thinking Aristotle overrated, Annas concentrates on post-Aristotelian moral philosophy. She is thoroughly at home in the new work on Hellenistic philosophy that scholars, herself included, have been publishing in the last couple of decades. Here she provides the fullest overview to date of Hellenistic (...) moral thought, beginning with Aristotle and covering the later Peripatetics, the Stoics, the Epicureans, the Cyrenaics, and the Skeptics both Academic and Pyrrhonist. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: Moral Philosophy at Seventeenth Century Harvard. By Norman Fiering.

This volume contains four versions of the lecture notes taken by Kant's students of his university courses in ethics given regularly over a period of some thirty years. The notes are very complete and expound not only Kant's views on ethics but many of his opinions on life and human nature. Much of this material has never before been translated into English. As with other volumes in the series, there are copious linguistic and explanatory notes and a glossary of key (...) terms. (shrink)

Beardsley and Beardsley are to be congratulated for providing a definitively "non-run-of-the-mill" introductory text which is entirely intelligible for the beginner and yet genuinely philosophical in content and presentation. Twelve very well written chapters, each with a bibliography, cover most of the important problems in metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. The authors even try to convey that philosophy has human and moral relevance beyond game activity. A significant feature of the book is its intelligent and prolonged discussion of religious beliefs. The (...) authors keep their own views well into the background and make good their claim to stimulate the student's own thinking. For that reason, teachers of widely different philosophical persuasions will find this book equally useful. —D. J. B. (shrink)

Using the principles and sometimes the conclusions of his teacher Adolf Stöhr, Cleve insists that he is giving a philosophical interpretation and not simply a philological reconstruction of these Pre-Socratics. The philosophers have been divided into 1) "Religious Reformers", 2) "Philosophers of Nature", 3) "Champions of Culture Politics"—"The Glossomorphics". There will certainly be disagreement on some of Cleve's interpretations but it must be said that Cleve carries through his philosophical reconstruction with admirable lucidity and consistency though, occasionally, some of his (...) criticisms of the "philologists" are rather waspish. Nevertheless, this is a splendid and important study which is a tribute to the author's erudition and insight.—D. J. B. (shrink)

This book stands as a panegyric of the glories and grandeur of Indian philosophy without managing to embody or display those heights of attainment itself. In the few essays that are worthwhile, the author attempts to correct a number of misconceptions about Indian thought: that it is world-denying, that it promotes spiritual pessimism, that it bases its philosophical claims more on intuition than on rational argument, and that it is concerned more with inner than with outer reality. In support of (...) his claims, he sets forth what he believes to be the basic tenets of Indian philosophy, which are: the divine or spiritual nature of the universe, the ultimate moral order of the universe, the transmigration of the soul, the ultimate destiny of man through "the liberation of the soul from bondage to the body," and the implicit trust placed in the testimony of seer-saints "to whom they [truths] are supposed to have been revealed beyond doubt in their direct and immediate experience." In a chapter entitled, "Svapramanatva and Svaprakasatva: An Inconsistency in Kumärila's Philosophy," he presents a fairly informative and well-reasoned argument that the validity of cognitions cannot be verified on the basis of both the inherent quality of the senses which give immediate satisfaction and the quality of external conditions which must await subsequent investigation. Finally, he soundly criticizes R. C. Zaehner's The Comparison of Religions for interpreting and evaluating Hindu religion and philosophy through the spectacles of Catholic Christianity. But his own contention, reiterated again and again throughout the book, that "there is nothing in common between Hindu religion and philosophy," makes no sense. Surely, one thing which distinguishes Indian philosophy from Greek and modern philosophy in the western world is the continual insistence by Indian thinkers that philosophical reflection and rational argumentation are not ends in themselves but merely means to salvation, paths to Enlightenment.--J. B. L. (shrink)

Students of philosophy, East and West, will be benefited greatly by this reprint of Professor Raju's pioneering study of comparative philosophy, which is the outgrowth of a series of lectures presented in Saugor University during 1955. Even for comparative philosophy, man must be the leitmotif, the common denominator for analyzing and interpreting the diversity of philosophical traditions. In his attempt to contribute to the "sense of the basic oneness of humanity, the human solidarity in spite of differences," he interprets the (...) three great philosophical traditions in terms of their respective approaches to the inward and outward aspects of reality. The central meaning or thrust of these traditions is expressed in the titles of the major sections of the book: "Western philosophy and the struggle for the liberation of the outward," "Chinese philosophy and human mindfulness," and "Indian philosophy and explication of inwardness." Western philosophy accomplished primarily a "liberating of the object or outwardness from its entanglement with the subject or inwardness." Chinese philosophy, by trying to build an ethics and philosophy on the emotional rather than the rational nature of man, has struck an even balance between the extremes of inward and outward by establishing clear lines of relatedness between individual men, society, and nature. Indian philosophy has been characterized chiefly by a "reflective inwardness," an overriding concern for the nature of the ätman, the interrelationship between intellect and intuition and the way to ultimate liberation from the round of rebirth and redeath through the immediate, intuitive apprehension of the unity of all things. The final section is dedicated to a general overview of the three major traditions in which the author delineates some of the more obvious and central parallels and distinctions among them. While the book is filled with useful information, novices are sure to be misled and professionals disappointed by the attempts to reduce entire religio-philosophical traditions to a set of neat interpretative labels, such as: Judaism is ethical zeal, Christianity is neighborly love, Buddhism is compassion, Islam is social solidarity, and the Upanishads is divine communion.--J. B. L. (shrink)

This work should be quite useful as a problem guide to phenomenalist and dualist metaphysics. Professor Yolton is concerned that any system be read both from an internal and an external perspective keeping them as separate and distinct as possible. He also cautions that the external perspective should not presuppose another metaphysic for that has often resulted in gross misreadings of earlier authors. In the first section of the book, phenomenalism, he shows how, for example, D. M. Armstrong and G. (...) Warnock have misread Berkeley and attacks G. Warnock and J. Austin's principle which rules out use of a technical irreducible language by philosophers. Solipsism and idealism as well as Berkeley's sensory phenomenalism are treated. In the second section of the book, dualism, Professor Yolton argues that some "transcendent Meaning Principle" is necessary to make the non-sensual side of dualism intelligible, outlines Plato's dualism as against Protagorian monism, indicates what he considers B. Russell's dualism and tries to show that Russell's treatment of one side is partially completed by C. I. Lewis' treatment of what Professor Yolton considers the other side. In the third section on meaning and truth he tries to establish 1) that there is a large measure of intranslatability between philosophical systems; 2) that meaning involves referrent necessarily; 3) that truth is defined by ontological rules; and 4) that correspondence is the basic truth-relation. Brief discussion is given of certain aspects of the works of P. Strawson, B. Russell, J. S. Mill, G. Ryle, W. V. O. Quine, Meinong, and Eric Tom. Slightly over half of this book is comprised of papers, some slightly modified, published from 1949 to 1961.--J. B. L. (shrink)

This is the second edition of a very imaginative collection of readings in aesthetics from Plato to the present. In this second edition, seven selections have been deleted and fifteen new selections have been added to greatly enhance its usefulness to beginning students in aesthetics. Additional readings on artistic creation and drama have been provided and a number of illustrations of works by Raphael, Giotto, Matisse, Dürer, Brancusi, Henry Moore, et al. have been included this time to illustrate relevant textual (...) materials. As in the first edition, the author's primary intention is to establish the field of aesthetics as having the same integrity and adventuresomeness as other areas of philosophical inquiry and debate. With this goal in view, he has organized the readings around "certain sets of basic problems that still seem worth debating and attempting to solve." Each section is centered around specific problems and issues in aesthetics, beginning with the broadest question, "What is Art?," and moving on to such issues as the nature of the various art forms, the nature of tragedy, the problem of response to art and, finally, the nature and goal of art criticism. Various readers and teachers in aesthetics no doubt, will find fault with or gaps in his selections of readings. But laying aside such parochial matters as ideology and personal taste, this volume puts in the hands of the student of aesthetics a compendium of essays on the major issues and areas of concern in aesthetics which can easily be supplemented by use of a xerox machine. The editor has included such scholarly aids as a brief introduction to each section, interpretative and cross-referential footnotes and a minimal bibliography.--J. B. L. (shrink)

The scholar who translated The Edicts of Ashoka into English has now set out to present and critically analyze some of "The Great Ideas of Indian Culture." While apparently engaging in a search for the ever-elusive "Perennial Philosophy" by invoking Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, et al., the author's comparative statements come off as being little more than decorative paraphernalia. He submits too completely to the mystique of the Socratic dialogue in claiming that "the outstanding characteristic of Indian thought is dialogue". (...) We can agree that one does find a type of verbal exchange which might merit the designation of "conversation," but not dialogue. At no place in either the Upanisads or Gïta does the student ever feel the slightest compulsion to question or contradict the words of his guru. Nikam also commits the grave philosophical indiscretion of using Platonic language about "universals" to speak of the Vedäntin "Universal Absolute,". This sort of cross-cultural comparison is extremely misleading in cases where the ideas being compared are similar or identical in appearance but dissimilar in substance. Even so, the book is extremely informative, and, in places, inspiring, in its illumination of the subtler dimensions of Indian thought. Western philosophers and interested lay-students should find this small volume most helpful in gaining a succinct but comprehensive presentation of the "Great Ideas of Indian Culture."--J. B. L. (shrink)

The forces of reason and revelation, sometimes intimately intertwined, sometimes diametrically opposed, formed the leitmotif of medieval metaphysics. Utilizing the classic theories of Chenu and Gilson, Persson examines the harmonious balance between ratio and revelatio in the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas. Basing his highly detailed analysis directly on the Summa Theologica, he ultimately shows how reason provided the systematizing impetus while revelation primarily determined the content of Thomistic thought. Examined are the subjects of divine love, causality, grace, and redemption--all of (...) which compose the formative elements of sacra doctrina. The author presents Thomas primarily as a theologian on whom the major influence was Scripture, not the patristics or Aristotle. When compared to the latter, however, Aquinas emerges as a revolutionary, breaking with traditions which undermined his thought. The author's thesis and methodology should be thought-provoking to both conservative and radical Thomists.--J. B. (shrink)

Vaisnavism in Bengal is justifiably renowned for its remarkable elaboration of the philosophy and cult of Divine Love as the essential expression of the nature of the God, Visnu-Krsna. This text, the first of six constituent parts expounding the philosophy of Bengal Vaisnavism, critically analyses the eight traditional bases of knowledge as a means of discovering the nature of Ultimate Reality. The author rejects most of the traditional pramänas as inadequate and false in providing "right cognition" of Ultimate Reality: namely, (...) perception inference, comparison, postulation, quantitative reasoning and tradition. Like both Mïmämsäka and Vedänta, he declares that, in the final analysis, only Sruti or Scripture serves as an infallible source of knowledge. But against the Vedänta of Sankara he rejects the notion that Bhagavat-Krsna, the Creator, Sustainer and Destroyer of the universe, can be fully apprehended through mystical intuition and claims that the non-phenomenal or spiritual nature of God is accessible only through devotional love and personal surrender. The devotional path to God encompasses but transcends both the paths of mystical knowledge and ascetic mortification. The highest aspect of the "power of essential selfhood" is personified in Krsna's eternally youthful consort, Rädhä. It is through the mystical realization of Ultimate Reality as the Divine Duality-in-Union as Rädhä-Krsna, that one experiences absolute Being, Consciousness and Bliss which is Brahman of the Upanisads and Vedänta. Sanskrists and students of Indian religion and philosophy will welcome the publication of this most valuable text which attempts for the first time to present the entire philosophy and theology of Gaudiya Vaisnavism of Bengal in systematic form and comprehensive manner.--J. B. L. (shrink)

The notion underlying Upanishadic and Vedäntin philosophy that Reality is unified, unique, and indivisible and that the world of plurality and multiplicity is unreal, has puzzled both Indian philosophers and students of Indian thought in the West. Many Western students of Vedänta have been misled by the idea that, in relation to the Ultimately Real, the phenomenal world is unreal or illusory. They have tended to read such terms as "unreal," "illusory," and "dreamlike" literally and thus have condemned Vedäntins to (...) the wholly untenable and unthinkable position of believing the empirical world to be absolutely non-existent. This most literate and erudite book explores the ontological status of the world of empirical and rational existence in the Upanishads and Shankara, the 9th century systematizer of Advaita Vedänta. Briefly, the argument of the author is that the phenomenal world is merely the tangible manifestation of primal nescience. Ignorance arises and persists because of man's tendency to superimpose the characteristics of one thing as it is recollected upon another thing as it is perceived. The traits of appearance are superimposed upon Reality, the non-Self upon the Self. The most common example used by Vedäntins is the act of mistakenly identifying the rope as a serpent. Only Brahman is real in an absolute and unqualified sense. Vyävahärika is the "world of names and forms based upon ignorance"; it is "the scene of our common endeavors which exhibits intelligible connections and is full of meaning and purpose" when viewed on its own terms and within its own limits. However, its indeterminable ontological status does not take away from its significance to the seeker after truth and Liberation. Perception, inference, intellection, and meditation all can serve as conductors along the path to salvation, provided they are not employed as ends in themselves. In the end, ratiocination must give way to intuitive insight, knowledge about must be superceded by knowledge of.--J. B. L. (shrink)

Here we go again--yet another testimony of disaffection with the western religious and philosophical tradition by a western philosopher who thinks he has found the answer to mankind's deepest longings and questionings in the "mystic east." He writes a somewhat verbose treatise on the transition from the state of confusion in the realm of language to the state of clarity in the realm of silence. Why is it that those who assert a firm belief in the benefit of remaining silent, (...) by and large, fail to practice what they preach? If he must speak, then he should speak clearly and coherently. Such sentences as this--"America is close to Oriental thought as much because she is a continent as otherwise"--simply will not do! Still despite its occasional verbosity and opacity, the book does contain some useful and intriguing accounts of one westerner's encounter with and training in the disciplines of Zen meditation. The author describes the experience of Zen as the physical and spiritual training of the whole man. He portrays the daily temple routine, the proper position for meditation, steps in the regulation of the breath, reflection upon koans and the frequent interviews with the master. In his own words, "the main direction of this philosophic essay is a movement from abstract intellectualism to the particular and to the real." He provides a brief and somewhat simplistic account of the development of recent philosophical movements and attempts to show how certain western philosophical trends which parallel Zen thought can contribute toward a fuller understanding of Zen philosophy. The recent trend which interests him is the tendency in Dewey, James, and Wittgenstein to speak more about the use of language and less about its meanings. This judgment, too, is simplistic but not entirely indefensible, given his purposes.--J. B. L. (shrink)