by Ulf Wolf
What is known as Classical (as different from Ancient) Indian philosophy extends from approximately 100 BCE to 1800 CE, marking the beginning of the modern period.
Ancient Indian thought, which is also philosophic in a broader sense, originated as early as 1500 BCE and appears in scriptures known as the Vedas.
Ancient Indian philosophy also includes the mystical explanations and elaborations on the Vedas known as Upanishads (700 BCE to 400 BCE), as well as early Buddhist writings (300 BCE to 500 CE), and the Sanskrit poem Bhagavad-Gita (Song of the Lord, 200 BCE to 200 CE).
Classical Indian philosophy is less concerned with spirituality than is its Ancient antecedent; rather, it concentrates on practical aspects of how people can know and communicate about everyday affairs. This practical Indian philosophy of the later classical and modern periods is distinguished from most other Indian religious and spiritual thought; there are, however, some exceptions.
Among them are philosophies represented by famous advocates of ancient Indian spiritual views, such as mystic philosopher Sri Aurobindo Ghose—a nationalist revolutionary who opposed British rule of India in the early 20th century—and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, who was president of India from 1962 to 1967, i.e., in the period immediately following the country’s struggle for independence.
Indian philosophy (as distinguished from Indian Religious Mysticism) is extensive, rich, and complex. Scholars analyze not only its significance and its insights, but also its classical teachings about knowledge and language. Meanwhile, the majority of Western students of Indian thought have been drawn to its religious and mystical teachings.
Relationship with Western Philosophy
It is well established that Indian and Western civilizations have maintained some form of contact for the better part of 3,000 years. In the 4th century BCE, for example, the Greek emperor Alexander took troops across the Indus River, which borders the western edge of the Indian subcontinent.
Even so, while trade subsequently continued, political contact between India and the West was largely insignificant until the 16th century.
While some scholars have argued that Platonism (the philosophy of ancient Greek thinker Plato) and neo-Platonism (a 3rd-century movement based on Platonism) were greatly influenced by Indian thought, it is now thought that the traditions of Indian and Western philosophy developed largely in ignorance of one another, and, until modern times, showed few signs of influencing one another.
Influence of Religion
Indian philosophy before 100 BCE cannot be meaningfully separated from religion, primarily because of the cultural integration of religious practices and mystical pursuits.
Take, for example, ceremonies celebrating birth, marriage, and death. They are (and still—in orthodox society—sometimes are) performed with recitations of Vedic verses (mantras). Later in classical Indian philosophy, different (non-orthodox) social practices developed. Thus, the orthodox classical schools of thought are often distinguished from non-orthodox classical schools by their allegiance to established forms of social practice rather than to the doctrines of the Veda.
Buddhism, on the other hand, constitutes much more of a break with Vedic practices than with the ideas developed in Vedic traditions of thought. In fact, the Upanishads—the mystical treatises continuous with the Vedas—foretell many Buddhist teachings. In ancient India, religion did not entail dogma so much as a way of life that permitted individual spiritual inquiry.
Mysticism—the claim that ultimate truth is only obtainable through spiritual experience—dominates much ancient Indian philosophy. Such experiences are thought to reveal a supreme and transmundane (beyond ordinary experience) reality and to provide (through first-hand experience) the meaning of life.
Mysticism shapes much classical and modern Indian thought as well; and it is commonly held that through meditation and the meditative techniques of yoga one can discover one’s true self (atman), or God (Brahman), or one can reach enlightenment (Nirvana).
The presumed indications of mystical experiences, such as the personal seeing of atman or God, were at the center of debate during the ancient period and went on to influence much subsequent Indian philosophy.
However, in some schools of classical Indian philosophy, such as Nyaya (Logic), neither religion nor mysticism is central. Rather, the questions of how it is that humans know what they know—and how they can truly mean what they say—are given priority.
History
When it comes to Indian thought, we can find it in the world’s oldest literature: The Veda.
The Veda is a collection of poems and hymns composed over several generations beginning around 1500 BCE. This collection is composed in Sanskrit, the intellectual language of both ancient and classical Indian civilizations—the Indian language of thought.
Four such Vedic collections were written and compiled, so we say—more for convenience than to reflect historical truth—that there are four Vedas, and these four, as a group, have since been considered as sacred Hindu texts.
Almost all of the Vedic poems are religious in nature and tend to concern the fates and tribulations of various gods. That said, many Vedic hymns and poems also address philosophic themes that grew more important in later periods, such as the henotheism that is now key to much Hindu theology.
Henotheism is the idea that one God, remaining one, takes on many different guises and forms, and that although individuals may worship several different manifestations of gods and goddesses, they really revere only the one Supreme Being through one of his (or her) many faces.
However, while the Vedic hymns mostly related the lives and adventures of Gods and Goddesses, to find out more about early Indian philosophy we turn to the Upanishads (secret doctrines—dating back to as early as the 7th century BCE).
Among other things, it was the early Upanishads that gave birth to the view of Brahman—the Absolute, or God—as in truth being the same as Atman—one’s true self.
Buddhism, now a major world religion, also emerged during this ancient period of Indian philosophy. As far as is currently known, Gotama Siddhattha, the Buddha and founder of Buddhism, lived during the 6th century BCE.
The Buddha held the supreme personal goal to be enlightenment or Nirvana, a state (or dimension) that may be compared to the later mystical so-called Brahman-knowledge of the Upanishads.
In the 3rd century BCE, during the reign of the Buddhist emperor Ashoka, a great canon of literature—now known as the Pali Canon—was compiled from the long remembered and recited (verbally passed on from generation to generation of Buddhist monks) discourses of the Buddha.
Other Buddhist scriptures, that would eventually become the Canon for the Mahayana tradition, were composed later.
The great classical schools of Indian philosophy—some number them at seven or eight—were first recorded in texts dating from as early as 100 BCE.
The founders of these schools are largely unknown except by traditional names—such as Aksapada Gautama, generally viewed as the founder of the Logic (Nyaya) school, and Badarayana, with Vedanta.
Early classical Indian philosophy is normally expressed in aphoristic (Sutra) texts complete with elaborate commentaries. The Sanskrit word Sutra means thread and, by extension, an “aphorism” that captures a philosophic tenet in a succinct statement.
The Sutra texts, usually accompanied with commentaries made by a second great thinker of a tradition, express world views, or philosophies, organized around reasons and arguments.
Outstanding thinkers in subsequent classical Indian philosophical writing include Buddhist Idealist Dhammakirti, who lived in the 7th century; Advaita Vedantin Samkara, of the 8th century; and Logic philosopher Gangesa, of the 14th century.
The writings of these men represented a gradual but steady advance in persuasiveness over previous arguments. As a whole, Indian philosophic reasoning and reflection advanced—both in overall sophistication of argument and in the volume and scope of new texts—by the gradual e
ffort of numerous authors, one building upon the thought efforts of his predecessors, ever refining and improving arguments of existing views and conclusions, much to the detriment (some hold) of fresh investigation into the perennial questions.
Indian Thought
Exegesis
The Mimamsa-Sutra of the Exegesis school appears to be the oldest text (100 BCE) of the philosophic sastra (holy writing) emerging at that time.
Exegesis as a school, is (to this day) primarily concerned with Vedic interpretation. Broad, philosophic questions such as “Why is the Veda sacred?” are addressed, and a generally realist view of nature (the belief that a world exists independent of the mind) and a common-sense view of knowledge (human beings know things by directly perceiving them or by deducing from other known things) grew to form the basis of this philosophic system.
Most efforts over the many centuries of this school have focused on “the right way to live.” Of late, however, the Exegesis philosophy focuses less on Dharma and more on technical issues in the philosophy of language.
This school continues into the modern period.
Vedanta
Vedanta is another school with a long and distinguished history, as well as a bewildering number of sub-schools.
Modeling itself after the Upanishads, Vedantic philosophy may be said to fall into two large sub-schools: (1) Advaita (monistic or non-dual) Vedanta, and (2) theistic Vedanta.
The main bone of contention between the two schools is the reality of God along with the reality of the world that God has created, or emanated. Advaita Vedanta holds that Ultimate Reality (Brahman) is identical with one’s true self (Atman) and transcends all forms. Thus, God and the world are but illusions.
Theistic Vedantins hold that God and the world exist separately from one’s self.
Since its inception, Vedanta has held an important place in Indian philosophy and is still the subject of serious study among present-day philosophers in India, as well as among Hindus throughout contemporary society.
Buddhism
Like Vedanta, Buddhism is also concerned with mystical experience.
Buddhist thinkers tend to compare the enlightenment (Nirvana) experience to awakening from a dream—of course, the Sanskrit word “buddha” means awakened. Buddhist thinkers have contributed significantly to Indian epistemology and metaphysics, and have had a complex influence on its overall history.
Analysis and Yoga
Comparatively speaking, Analysis (Samkhya) and Yoga are relatively minor philosophies. Both emerged before the 2nd century BCE, but neither spawned a continuing philosophy comparable to that of the schools above, neither did they participate significantly in later classical debates.
The Analysis school subscribes to a metaphysical dualism and claims that two types of things ultimately exist—individual souls and nature. This school devoted itself to analyzing nature in order to better view oneself as liberated from karma and rebirth: as pure and blissful, self-conscious, and aloof from nature.
The school of Yoga takes a similar metaphysical stance, though it also—and primarily, especially these days—pursues a psychological and yogic-practice dimension that the Analysis school lacks.
Logic and Atomism
Two other schools, Logic (Nyaya) and Atomism (Vaisesika), specialize in questions of epistemology (“nyaya” means critical inquiry) and of the types of objects and generalities we experience every day.
Both schools have extensive literatures, and later Logic (after 1400 CE) is known for its professional techniques of cognitive analysis.
Founded in the early classical period, both schools base their approach upon early Sutra texts, and from their inception, Logic speculated about knowledge itself, while Atomism speculated about the things known.
For the next 1,000 or so years, their literatures remained distinct; however, the schools were combined by the great 11th-century innovator Udayana and after that have been known simply as Logic.
Carvaka
The Carvaka school, a classical school of materialism and skepticism, is primarily known for its sometimes ridiculing attacks on religious practices, but does, at least from a Western perspective, certainly evince that not all classical Indian philosophy is religiously or mystically oriented.
While the Logic school also rejects the influence of religious beliefs, Carvaka, unlike Logic, goes beyond advocating knowledge based on natural experience by ridiculing what it sees as superstition, including the widely held Indian belief in rebirth.
Philosophical Perspectives
Most of the classical Indian schools present developed and distinct world views, and have formed comprehensive philosophies by fusing the positions of its metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics.
While it is true that systematic philosophies should stand on their own feet as whole bodies of thought, it sometimes provides a better view of them to separate and delineate the metaphysical, the epistemological, and the ethical issues within them, particularly in study and debate.
And when it comes to Indian philosophy, compartmentalizing its various branches also facilitates a comparison with Western philosophy.
That said, here goes:
Metaphysics
Spiritual metaphysics—a field that currently receives little attention among philosophers in academia here in the West—ponders the nature of a Supreme Being and its relation to the world.
Indian Buddhism, Advaita Vedanta, and theistic Vedanta all have contributed to this debate.
And when it comes to spiritual metaphysics, the almost uniform view that only one spiritual being—if “being” is even the right word—ultimately exists, is likely the most important consideration that Indian thought upholds, though with variations:
Buddhist philosophy promotes the interdependence of everything; theistic Vedanta finds no gap between the world and God—the world, in other words, is God’s body; and Advaita Vedanta holds that everyone’s true self is nothing other than Brahman, the Absolute.
The field of analytic metaphysics—as opposed to spiritual metaphysics— which examines not the spirit and ultimate truth, but everyday experience and language, is currently more prominent among Western philosophers.
Epistemology
Being one of the more active branches of philosophy in the West, epistemology attempts to answer questions involving the nature and limits of knowledge itself.
When it comes to epistemology, the Indian Logic school does have much to offer for contemporary analysis, as does the school of Buddhist Idealism (Yogacara).
The Logic school lays out, with detailed elaboration, four methods of personal knowledge: perception; inference; analogical acquisition of vocabulary; and authoritative testimony.
Logic then goes on to challenges skepticism—the view that true knowledge is an impossibility. According to Logic, even though humans are fallible, they should assume that they are justified in their beliefs, and that any doubt of those beliefs should be reasonable or should have its own grounds for consideration.
Much Western reflection (especially in the last two hundred years) assumes that any form of doubt undermines claims of knowledge.
Buddhist Idealism, meanwhile, takes a pragmatic middle ground between skepticism and Logic’s defense of everyday beliefs. For the Buddhist Idealist, the test of truth is whether or not humans actually get what they want—and manage to avoid what they do not want.
Indian thought, with its wealth of mystical literature and philosophic defenses of mysticism, brings much to the epistemology of religious belief; in particular, many Indian philosophers, while of different schools, have over time held that mystical experience does, in fact, have objective epistemic value in revealing a spiritual reality—holding up as a parallel the value of sense experience in revealing physical reality.
Ethics
As covered earlier, another major branch of Western philosophy is ethics—the branch that examines human motivations and actions.
Indian interest in eth
ics—ranging from the Buddha’s ethical teachings of enlightenment, to the caste system of society, and to Mohandas Gandhi’s political philosophy of non-injury (ahimsa)—is far more widespread than interest in metaphysics or epistemology. The prevailing philosophy of non-injury is certainly a persuasive candidate for a universal ethical prescription to transcend the boundaries of culture as well as religion.
Naturally, the Indian philosophies concerning karma also contain a strong ethical element since these as a rule presuppose rebirth, whether in human or animal form, and whether in this or in other worlds. Since, according to karma, the nature of one’s deeds determines one’s future state, the universe includes the ethical laws of moral payback, and Indian classical philosophers weave numerous variations on such views into their overall beliefs, whether Buddhist, Vedantic, Logic, and Carvaka.
For the near Indian certainty that what you do unto others will in fact be done to you—whether in this or in a future life, whether now or tomorrow, is the essence of karma, and a good argument for a non-violent and ethical approach to (one’s current) life.
Contemporary Developments
Today, hardly any original philosophy is being written in Sanskrit.
Indian philosophers now write in either modern Indian languages or in English. Further, the relatively recent advent of scientific thought and of the modern university has drastically altered the Indian intellectual community, and classical philosophy survives mainly in the influences it exerts among its students.
That said, today, many philosophers—not only in India, but particularly so—have re-discovered and now champion important philosophic theses of classical Indian thought, and this movement may eventually bring a global standing to classical Indian philosophy comparable to that of classical Greek philosophy.