A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
Susanta Bhattacharya, a doctoral candidate in Indian philosophy in Kraków, Poland, published in Journal of Indian Philosophy earlier this year and asked us to share a summary. The full title of the piece is “Does Liberation Entail Disembodiment? Re-examining the Continue reading Does liberation entail disembodiment? A guest post by Susanta Bhattacharya
How does one know about the self, according to the three main schools discussed in my last post? Buddhist Epistemological School (Dharmakīrti): the self does not exist. The only thing that exists is a stream (santāna) of causally linked momentary Continue reading Cognition of the self
Background: This year I taught again a class on Sanskrit philosophy (for the first time since 2021). I only had 12 meetings, of three hours each, hence I had do made drastic choices. The following is the result of these Continue reading Intro to Sanskrit philosophy
If Nāgārjuna, the great Madhyamaka Buddhist philosopher, is known for anything, it’s his doctrine of the emptiness (śūnyatā) of all things. But in his most famous work, Nāgārjuna warns his audience about emptiness: “Misperceived emptiness ruins a person of dull Continue reading Snakes wrongly grasped: on the psychedelic experiences of Musk and Manson
Swami, Mahāmahopādhyāya Bhadreshdas. Svāminārāyaṇasiddhāntasudhā. 3rd ed., Swaminarayan Aksharpith, July 2024, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, pp. 468. Sanskrit. ₹ 600. Digital Copy (Open Access): https://research.baps.org/publications/books/swaminarayan_siddhant_sudha/ The landscape of Indian philosophy continues to evolve with the arrival of a new vādagrantha—a philosophical treatise that Continue reading Book Review of Svāminārāyaṇasiddhāntasudhā by Mahāmahopādhyāya Bhadreshdas Swami (Reviewed by Aksharananddas Swami)
When I was in grad school, a big academic fashion was to heap scorn on the idea that mystical experience could be something cross-cultural: everything was reducible to social context, and the similarities of experience didn’t really matter, as I Continue reading Finding mysticism in unexpected places
Kalidas Bhattacharyya. New Perspectives in Indian Philosophy [Ed. Nirmalya Narayan Chakraborty]. X+435pp., index. The Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, 2023. ₹ 600.00 (paperback). The New Perspectives in Indian Philosophy (henceforth NPIP) edited by Chakraborty is a scholarly collection of philosophical Continue reading Book Review of Kalidas Bhattacharyya. New Perspectives in Indian Philosophy [Ed. Nirmalya Narayan Chakraborty]. (Reviewed by Krishna Mani Pathak)
Binod Kumar Choudhary & Debajyoti Gangopadhyay, Editors. Nalanda Dialogue Series – Volume 1 – Prolegomena to Intercultural Dialogue: Modern Engagement with Indian Knowledge Tradition. Xvi + 273 pp., index. Nava Nalanda Mahavihara, 2022. ₹780 (paperback). The Nalanda Dialogue Series is Continue reading Book Review of Nalanda Dialogue Series – Volume 1 – Prolegomena to Intercultural Dialogue: Modern Engagement with Indian Knowledge Tradition (Reviewed by David Simone)
I recently received a note from Prof. Nirmalya Chakraborty (Rabindra Bharati University) about an exciting new digital library. It includes three categories: Navya-Nyāya Scholarship in Nabadwip, Philosophers of Modern India, and Twentieth Century Paṇḍitas of Kolkata. You can find the Continue reading Digital Library Project, Bhaktivedanta Research Center (Kolkata)
Readers of the Indian Philosophy Blog may be interested to learn about a new article in the latest issue of the Journal of World Philosophies: “Pramāṇavāda and the Crisis of Skepticism in the Modern Public Sphere” by Amy Donahue (Kennesaw State University). Continue reading New Article: “Pramāṇavāda and the Crisis of Skepticism in the Modern Public Sphere” by Amy Donahue