East Asian and Indian philosophy Books

Book SynopsisEdited by Michael Hunter and Martin Kern and featuring contributions by preeminent scholars of early China, Confucius and the Analects Revisited: New Perspectives on Composition, Dating, and Authorship critically examines the long-standing debates surrounding the history of the Analects, for two millennia considered the most authoritative source of the teachings of Confucius (551–479 BCE). Unlike most previous scholarship, it does not take the traditional view of the Analects’ origins as given. Instead, it explores the validity and the implications of recent revisionist critiques from historical, philosophical, and literary perspectives, and further draws on recently discovered ancient manuscripts and new technological advances in the Digital Humanities. As such, it opens up new ways for productive engagement with the text. Contributors: Mark Csikszentmihalyi, Paul van Els, Robert Eno, Joachim Gentz, Paul R. Goldin, Michael Hunter, Martin Kern, Esther Klein, John Makeham, Matthias L. Richter.Table of ContentsContents List of Figures and Tables Notes on Contributors Introduction  Michael Hunter and Martin Kern 1 A Critical Overview of Some Contemporary Chinese Perspectives on the Composition and Date of Lunyu  John Makeham 2 The Lunyuas an Accretion Text  Robert Eno 3 The Lunyuas Western Han Text  Michael Hunter 4 Confucius and His Disciples in the Lunyu: The Basis for the Traditional View  Paul R. Goldin 5 The Lunyu, a Homeless Dog in Intellectual History: On the Dating of Discourses on Confucius’s Success and Failure  Joachim Gentz 6 Confucius’s Sayings Entombed: On Two Han Dynasty Bamboo LunyuManuscripts  Paul van Els 7 Manuscript Formats and Textual Structure in Early China  Matthias L. Richter 8 Interlocutor Collections, the Lunyu, and Proto-Lunyu Texts  Mark Csikszentmihalyi 9 Sima Qian’s Kongzi and the Western Han Lunyu  Esther Klein 10 Kongzi as Author in the Han  Martin Kern Index >

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Book SynopsisIn Zhu Guangqian and Benedetto Croce on Aesthetic Thought, Mario Sabattini analyses Croce’s influence on the aesthetic thought of Zhu Guangqian. Zhu Guangqian is one of the most representative figures of contemporary Chinese aesthetics. Since the '30s, he had an active role in China both on the literary and philosophical scenes, and, through his writings, he exerted an important influence in the moulding of numerous generations of intellectuals. Some of his works have been widely read, and they still provoke considerable interest in China, on the mainland as well as in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The volume also presents a revised translation of Zhu Guangqian’s Wenyi xinlixue (Psychology of Art and Literature).Table of ContentsPreface Thematic Bibliography of Mario Sabattini Contents Introduction: Zhu Guangqian and Croce Zhu Guangqian: The Psychology of Art and Literature Foreword 1 Analysis of Aesthetic Experience: the Intuition of Form 2 Analysis of Aesthetic Experience: “Psychical Distance” 3 Analysis of Aesthetic Experience: the Ego-Object Identity (Empathy) 4 Analysis of Aesthetic Experience: Aesthetic Sense and Physiology (the Theory of “Inner Imitation”) 5 Some Erroneous Interpretations of Aesthetic Experience 6 Aesthetic Sense and Association of Ideas 7 Art and Morality: a Historical Review 8 Art and Morality: towards a Theory 9 The Beautiful and the Ugly in Nature: the Errors in Idealism and in Naturalism 10 What Do We Call “Beautiful” 11 A Criticism of the Crocian Aesthetic: The Problems of Communication and Value 12 Play and the Origin of Art 13 Artistic Creation: Imagination and Inspiration 14 Artistic Creation: Genius and Human Effort Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisBuddhist Philosophy of Consciousness brings Buddhist voices to the study of consciousness. This book explores a variety of different Buddhist approaches to consciousness that developed out of the Buddhist theory of non-self. Topics taken up in these investigations include: how we are able to cognize our own cognitions; whether all conscious states involve conceptualization; whether distinct forms of cognition can operate simultaneously in a single mental stream; whether non-existent entities can serve as intentional objects; and does consciousness have an intrinsic nature, or can it only be characterized functionally? These questions have all featured in recent debates in consciousness studies. The answers that Buddhist philosophers developed to such questions are worth examining just because they may represent novel approaches to questions about consciousness.Table of Contents Notes on Contributors  Introduction Part 1: Conceptualism and Nonconceptualism  Introduction to Part 1 1 Knowing Blue: Ābhidharmika Accounts of the Immediacy of Sense Perception  Robert H. Sharf 2 Nonconceptual Awareness in Yogācāra and Madhyamaka Thought  John Spackman 3 Turning Earth to Gold: the Early Yogācāra Understanding of Experience Following Non-conceptual Cognition  Roy Tzohar Part 2: Meta-cognition  Introduction to Part 2 4 Whose Consciousness? Reflexivity and the Problem of Self-Knowledge  Christian Coseru 5 Should Mādhyamikas Refute Subjectivity? Thoughts on what might be at stake in debates on self-awareness  Dan Arnold 6 Self-Knowledge and Non-self  Mark Siderits 7 The Genesis of *Svasaṃvitti-saṃvittiReconsidered  Toru Funayama 8 Dharmapāla on the Cognition of Other Minds (paracittajñāna)  Shinya Moriyama Part 3: Mental Consciousness in East Asian Buddhism: MSF  Introduction to Part 3 9 Mānasa-pratyakṣa as the Perception of Conventionally Real (prajñaptisat) Properties – Interpreting Dignāga’s mānasa-pratyakṣa based on Clues from Kuiji  Ching Keng 10 Mental Consciousness and Its Objects  Zhihua Yao 11 Vasubandhu’s Theory of Memory: a Reading based on the Chinese Commentaries  Chen-kuo Lin  Index

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Book SynopsisFrom the Greeks to the Arabs and Beyond written by Hans Daiber, is a six volume collection of Daiber’s scattered writings, journal articles, essays and encyclopaedia entries on Greek-Syriac-Arabic translations, Islamic theology and Sufism, the history of science, Islam in Europe, manuscripts and the history of oriental studies. It also includes reviews and obituaries. Vol. V and VI are catalogues of newly discovered Arabic manuscript originals and films/offprints from manuscripts related to the topics of the preceding volumes.

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Book SynopsisFrom the Greeks to the Arabs and Beyond written by Hans Daiber, is a six volume collection of Daiber’s scattered writings, journal articles, essays and encyclopaedia entries on Greek-Syriac-Arabic translations, Islamic theology and Sufism, the history of science, Islam in Europe, manuscripts and the history of oriental studies. It also includes reviews and obituaries. Vol. V and VI are catalogues of newly discovered Arabic manuscript originals and films/offprints from manuscripts related to the topics of the preceding volumes.Table of ContentsAbbreviations Rules of Transliteration Introduction Description of the Texts Aligarh, India Baghdad, Iraq Beirut, Lebanon Berlin, Germany Birmingham, Great Britain Bursa, Turkey Cairo, Egypt Cambridge, Great Britain Cambridge (Mass.), USA Damascus, Syria Delhi, India Dublin, Ireland Escorial, Spain Evora, Portugal Florence, Italy Gotha, Germany Hyderabad, India Istanbul, Turkey Leiden, Netherlands Lisbon, Portugal London, Great Britain Lucknow, India Manisa, Turkey Mosul, Iraq Munich, Germany Najaf, Iraq New Haven, USA Oxford, Great Britain Paris, France Patna (Bankipore), India Princeton, USA Qumm, Iran Rampur, India Taʿizz, Yemen Tarim, Yemen Tashkent, Uzbekistan Tehran, Iran Toledo, Spain Tonk, India Vatican City State Vienna, Austria Washington, USA Manuscripts of Barhebraeus’ Works Rare or Unpublished Books and Articles The Arabic Inscription of the Madrasa al-Mustanṣiriyya, Baghdad (founded 631/1234) Indices Literature and its Abbreviations Photos of Selected Manuscripts The Power of the Word  The Linguistic Form of Greek-Arabic Translations  Unknown Views of Orientalists on Franz Taeschner, Die Psychologie Qazwīnīs (1912) Indices “The Power of the Word” Postscriptum

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Book SynopsisIn imperial China, the Yijing (Book of Changes) was not just read as a Confucian classic for moral cultivation, but also put into practice to solve problems of everyday life. To explain why the Yijing was so widely used in China, this volume examines its multiple textual layers, its divinatory practices, its medical uses, and its role in Chinese modernity. Together, the ten chapters demonstrate that the Yijing is indeed a living text used by both the educated elite and the populace to alleviate their fear and anxiety. Contributors are: Andrea Bréard, Chang Chia-Feng, Constance A. Cook, Stéphane Feuillas, Tze-ki Hon, Liao Hsien-huei, William Matthews, Tao Yingna, Xing Wang, and Zhao Lu.Table of ContentsA Note on Style List of Tables and Illustrations Notes on Contributors Introduction: From “Historical Turn” to “Everyday Life Yijing”  Tze-ki Hon Part 1 The Unique Voice of the Yijing 1 Stalk and Other Divination Traditions before the Changes Canon: Views from Newly Discovered Texts  Constance A. Cook and Andrea Bréard 2 The Book of Changes as a Cosmological Manual in Han China  Zhao Lu 3 Yijing Divination and Religion during the Tang Dynasty  Xing Wang Part 2 The Yijing Prediction Practices 4 Predicting Success: Song Literati’s Uses of the Changes in Divination  Liao Hsien-huei 5 Prediction Based on the Past: Yang Wanli’s (1127–1206) Commentary on the Changes  Stéphane Feuillas 6 Yijing and Medicine: Discussions of the Gate of Life in Late Imperial China  Chang Chia-Feng 7 Hexagrams and Mathematics: Symbolic Approaches to Prediction from the Song to the Qing  Andrea Bréard Part 3 Yijing and Modernity 8 Predicting a Regime Change: The Politicization of the Yijing in Twentieth Century China  Tze-ki Hon 9 Simplified Procedure and Extended Divination Objects: A Study of Plum Blossom Yi Numerology  Tao Yingna 10 Reducing Uncertainty: Six Lines Prediction in Contemporary China  William Matthews Index

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Book SynopsisThe Zhou Changes, better known in the West as I Ching, is one of the masterpieces of world literature. This book, the climax of more than forty years of research in Chinese archaeology, explores the text’s origins in the oracle-bone and milfoil divinations of Bronze Age China and how it transformed over the course of the Zhou dynasty into the first of the Chinese classics. The book provides an in-depth survey of the theory and practice of divination to demonstrate how the hexagram and line statements of the text were produced and how they were understood at the time.Table of ContentsPreface Acknowledgements List of Figures and Tables Conventions Introduction Part 1 The Context 1 The Zhou Changes: Received Text and Early Manuscripts 2 The Philosophy of Divination in Ancient China 3 Turtle-Shell Divination 4 Milfoil Divination 5 Milfoil Divination with the Zhou Changes 6 The Poetic Imagination Part 2 The Text 7 The Hexagram 8 The Hexagram Statement 9 The Line Statement 10 Intra-hexagram and Inter-hexagram Structures of Hexagram Texts 11 The Hexagram Sequence 12 From Divination to Philosophy Works Cited Index of Zhou Changes Lines Index of Zhou Changes Hexagram and Line Statements Cited General Index

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Book SynopsisThis is the first comprehensive book that presents the manifold aspects of divination and prognostication in traditional and modern China, from the early period of oracle bones to present-day fortune-tellers. It introduces what is out there in the field of Chinese divination and prognostication, and how we can further explore it especially through different disciplines. Eminent specialists outline the classifications of divination, recently excavated texts, the relationship between practitioners and clients, the place of the “occult” arts in cosmology, literature and religion, and the bureaucratic system. Contributors are: Constance Cook, Richard J. Smith, Marc Kalinowski, Stephen R. Bokenkamp, Lü Lingfeng, Liao Hsien-huei, Philip Clart, Fabrizio Pregadio, Esther-Maria Guggenmos, Andrew Schonebaum, and Stéphanie Homola.

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Book SynopsisThe notion of effortlessness is central to the self-understanding of the Tibetan contemplative tradition known as Dzogchen. This book explores this key notion from a variety of perspectives, highlighting the distinctive role it plays in the Dzogchen approach’s doctrinal architecture and meditative programme. The book’s focus is on the early development of the Dzogchen tradition, especially as codified in a set of hitherto unstudied commentaries by the 10th-century scholar and meditation master Nubchen Sangye Yeshe. A full annotated translation of the commentaries is provided, along with an edition of the Tibetan texts on facing pages.Table of Contents9789004534223 Acknowledgements Conventions Used Sigla Introduction Part 1 An Essay in Approaching Effortlessness 1 Evoking Effortlessness 2 Effortlessness as a Trope of Demarcation 3 Looking Back: A Precedent in Nyak Jñānakumāra 4 An Internal Contradiction? 5 Coalescence of the Transcendence-Immanence Relational Polarity 6 Effortlessness as Path 7 Inwardness and Spaciousness 8 The Question of Method 9 Effortlessness and Conduct 10 Encounter and Transmission Conclusion Part 2 The Texts Introductory Remarks  1 A Note on the Editions of the Orally Transmitted Injunctions of the Nyingma  2 Overview of the Root Texts in Their Various Versions  3 Categories of Variants 1 rJe btsan dam pa’i ’grel pa / Commentary on the Holy Revered One (JDG) 2 Byang chub sems bde ba ’phra bkod kyi don ’grel / Meaning Commentary on the Inlaid Jewel of Bliss, the Enlightened Mind (DPG) 3 rDo rje gzong phugs kyi ’grel pa / Commentary on the Adamantine Piercing Awl (DZG) 4 rTse mo byung rgyal ’grel pa / Commentary on the Victorious Peak (TBG) Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThis book is a philosophical-historical examination of the influence of the knowledge of China imparted by the Jesuits on the thinking of the German Enlightenment in the 18th century. It is not primarily concerned with a comprehensive reconstruction of the philosophy of the thinkers discussed, but rather with the political and intellectual contextualisation of a line of thought that recognised the practical philosophy and state organisation of China as different from that of Europe, while equal to it and in some respects superior to it. This challenged the claim of theology that Christian revelation alone provided access to truth. The volume analyses the opposition to this line of thought, especially on the part of Protestant orthodoxy. It argues that in the German Enlightenment of the 18th century, the possibility emerged to conceive philosophy on the basis of reason as a phenomenon not limited to Europe but as a path followed under different conditions in China.

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Book SynopsisMahayana, Theravada, ancient, modern? Even at the most basic level, the diversity of Buddhism makes a comprehensive approach daunting. This book is a first step in solving the problem. In foregrounding the bodies of practitioners, a solid platform for analysing the philosophy of Buddhism begins to become apparent. Building upon somaesthetics Buddhism is seen for its ameliorative effect, which spans the range of how the mind integrates with the body. This exploration of positive effect spans from dreams to medicine. Beyond the historical side of these questions, a contemporary analysis includes its intersection with art, philosophy, and ethnography.

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Book SynopsisThe open access publication of this book has been published with the support of the Swiss National Science Foundation. Al-Bīrūnī (ca. 973-1050) was an innovative encyclopaedist thinker. He is particularly known to have investigated into India of his time. Yet, his life and the circumstances of his encounter with Indian languages, culture and sciences are still shrouded in mystery and legends. This research brings to light elements of his intellectual journey based on well-grounded analysis so as to contextualise al-Bīrūnī’s work of transmission of Indian philosophies into Arabic. Thanks to a theoretical framework rooted in a multidisciplinary approach, including Translation Studies, it enables to comprehend the full scope of his work and to analyse deeply his motives and choices of interpretation.Table of ContentsAcknowledgements List of Figures and Tables Abbreviations and Other Usages Introduction 1 Cultural Contexts of al-Bīrūnī’s Work and Writings  1.1 Persian and Islamic Spheres of Influence  1.2 Al-Bīrūnī’s Visits to al-Hind  1.3 Elements of Culture of Gandhāra and Panjab  1.4 Concluding Remarks 2 The Social and Intellectual Contexts  2.1 Building up Theoretical Knowledge on al-Hind  2.2 Collaborations and Multiculturalism at Royal Courts  2.3 Al-Bīrūnī and Indian Scholars  2.4 The Transmission of Living Traditions  2.5 Concluding Remarks 3 Al-Bīrūnī’s Translations within the Sāṅkhya-Yoga Traditions  3.1 Sāṅkhya-Yoga Literature Predating al-Bīrūnī’s Time  3.2 Tenets of Sāṅkhya and Yoga  3.3 Authorships and Titles  3.4 Intersections and Disagreements of the Two Philosophical Systems  3.5 Concluding Remarks 4 Al-Bīrūnī’s Interpretative Strategies  4.1 Al-Bīrūnī’s Methods through the Lens of Translation Studies  4.2 Three Explicit Transformations  4.3 Al-Bīrūnī’s Reshaping of the Original Texts  4.4 Al-Bīrūnī’s Transformations of Content  4.5 Concluding Remarks 5 On the Kitāb Pātanğal and Its Sanskrit Source  5.1 Scholarship Review  5.2 The Commentary as an Integrated Part of the Kitāb Pātanğal  5.3 A Problematic Laudatory Passage  5.4 Concluding Remarks 6 On the Kitāb Sānk and Its Sanskrit Source  6.1 Scholarship Review  6.2 Methodological Considerations  6.3 Passages of the Kitāb Sānk and the Tradition of the Sāṅkhyakārikā  6.4 Concluding Remarks Conclusion Appendix: Passages Related to the Kitāb Sānk Found in the Taḥqīq mā li-l-Hind Glossary of Sanskrit Terms as al-Bīrūnī Interpreted Them into Arabic Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisFew religious innovations have shaped Chinese history like the emergence of spirit-writing during the Song dynasty. From a divinatory technique it evolved into a complex ritual practice used to transmit messages and revelations from the Gods. This resulted in the production of countless religious scriptures that now form an essential corpus, widely venerated and recited to this day, that is still largely untapped by research. Using historical and ethnographic approaches, this volume for the first time offers a comprehensive overview of the history of spirit-writing, examining its evolution over a millennium, the practices and technologies used, and the communities involved.Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Figures and Tables Note on Formal Conventions Dynastic Table 1 Introduction to the Volume  Matthias Schumann and Elena Valussi Part 1 Overview Papers 2 Making the Gods Write: A Short History of Spirit-Written Revelations in China, 1000–1400  Vincent Goossaert 3 Spirit-Writing Practices from the Song to Ming Periods and Their Relation to Politics and Religion  Wang Chien-chuan 王 見川 4 Women, Goddesses, and Gender Affinity in Spirit-Writing  Elena Valussi Part 2 Changing Techniques and Practices 5 Terminology and Typology of Spirit-Writing in Early Modern China: A Preliminary Study  Hu Jiechen 6 The Transcendent of the Plate The Lingji zhimi 靈乩指迷 (Instructions on the numinous stylus) and the Reform of Spirit-Writing Techniques during the First Half of the Twentieth Century  Fan Chun-wu 范 純武 Part 3 Spirit-Writing and the Literati Elites in Late Imperial China 7 Instantiating the Genealogy of the Way: Spirit-Writing in the Construction of Peng Dingqiu’s Confucian Pantheon  Daniel Burton-Rose 8 A Credulous Skeptic: Ji Yun on the Mantic Arts and Spirit-Writing  Michael Lackner 9 The Liu-Han Altar: Between a Literati Spirit-Writing Altar and Popular Religion  Zhu Mingchuan 朱 明川 Part 4 Spirit-Writing and Redemptive Societies 10 “Protecting the Dao and Transmitting the Classics” The New Religion to Save the World and the Confucian Dimension of Spirit-Writing in Republican China  Matthias Schumann 11 Spirit-Writing and the Daoyuan’s Gendered Teachings  Xia Shi 12 The Phoenix Perches in the Land of the Kami: Spirit-Writing from Yiguandao to Tendō  Nikolas Broy Part 5 Local Communities and Transregional Networks 13 The Nineteenth Century Spirit-Writing Movement and the Transformation of Local Religion in Western Guangdong  Ichiko Shiga 14 The Rise of Spirit-Writing Cults in Chaozhou: Reassessing the Role of Charitable Halls  Li Guoping 李 國平 15 Spirit-Writing Altars in Contemporary Hong Kong: A Case Study of Fei Ngan Tung Buddhism and Daoism Society  Luo Dan 羅 丹 16 A Motley Phoenix? On the Diversity of Spirit-Writing Temples and Their Practices in Puli, Taiwan  Paul R. Katz Index

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Book SynopsisWhat does it mean to be human? We invite the reader to discuss this most fundamental issue in philosophy and to do so in an intercultural framework. The question of the human was the starting point for a legendary discussion between two German philosophers who met in Davos in 1929. We return to this historical event and re-imagine the debate between Martin Heidegger and Ernst Cassirer from a global perspective. Generating twenty papers from elaborate discussions, our authors contribute to the thought experiment by inviting the Japanese philosopher Nishida Kitarō from Kyoto and other Japanese thinkers into the debate to overcome the challenge of Eurocentrism inherent to these historic days in Davos.Table of ContentsPreface Notes on Contributors Introduction  Ralf Müller Part 1 Recontextualizing the Davos Debate 1 Revisiting the Debate between Cassirer and Heidegger in Davos: Imagination, Finiteness, and Morals  Michel Dalissier 2 The Davos Debate, Pure Philosophy and Normativity: Thinking from the Perspective of the History of Philosophy  Esther Oluffa Pedersen 3 Humans and Other Animals: The Forgotten Other Beyond Davos and Kyoto  John C. Maraldo 4 Anthropology as an Intercultural Philosophy of Culture  Tobias Endres 5 Heidegger and Cassirer on Schematism: Reflections on an Intercultural Philosophy  Domenico Schneider Part 2 Nishida Joining the Davos Debate 6 Absolute Self-Contradictory Human Existence: Nishida in Davos  Francesca Greco 7 Cassirer and Nishida: Mathematical Crosscurrents in Their Philosophical Paths  Rossella Lupacchini 8 Lask, Heidegger, and Nishida: From Meaning as Object to Horizon and Place  John W.M. Krummel 9 From Kyoto and Hong Kong to Davos: Nishida Kitaro and Mou Zongsan’s possible contributions to the Cassirer-Heidegger Debate  Tak-Lap Yeung 10 From the Problem of Meaning via Basic Phenomena to the Question of Philosophy after Metaphysics: Cassirer, Heidegger, and Nishida  Ingmar Meland 11 The Self-Aware Individual and the Kyoto School’s Quest for a Philosophical Anthropology  Dennis Stromback Part 3 German-Japanese Ramifications of the Davos Debate 12 The Davos Debate and Japanese Philosophy: Welt-Schema and Einbildungskraft in Tanabe and Miki  Tatsuya Higaki 13 From Despair to Authentic Existence: Kierkegaard’s Anthropology of Despair in the Light of Nishitani’s Thought  Sebastian Hüsch 14 Cassirer, Heidegger, and Miki: The Logic of the Dual Transcendence of the Imagination  Steve Lofts 15 Now, Ever or After: Contrasting the Pure Lands of D.T. Suzuki and Tanabe Hajime  Rossa Ó Muireartaigh 16 On Homo Faber: Nishida and Miki  Takushi Odagiri 17 Anti-Cartesianism East and West: Watsuji and Heidegger on the Possibility of Significant Dealing with Entities  Hans Peter Liederbach 18 Miki and the Myth of Humanism  Fernando Wirtz 19 Hineingehalten in das Nichts: Die Metaphysik und das Andere des Seins  Emanuel Seitz Index

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Book SynopsisA beautifully crafted story with many twists and turns, The Roof Beneath Their Feet is easily one of the best contemporary Hindi novels you have read in a long time.

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