A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
I am happy to announce that I will be serving as the Book Review Editor for the Indian Philosophy Blog. I’d like to invite everyone to check out our new Book Review Guidelines. The distinctive thing about book reviews on Continue reading Book reviews for the Indian Philosophy Blog
Jay Garfield’s research may interest you or not, but his methodological musings are worth reading anyway. Here I linked to the interview where he compared the exclusion of Indian philosophy from syllabi, justified on the basis of the fact that Continue reading Garfield (and Daya Krishna) on intercultural philosophy and the power of languages
If anyone is interested, see this post on Malcolm Keating’s blog:http://malcolmkeating.blogspot.com/2015/01/virtual-sanskrit-reading-group.htm Interested people could contact Malcolm on his blog or post comments here.
What are the principles by which we divide texts into portions, and why would we want to do that in the first place? What Elisa has referred to as “the prescriptive portion of the Veda” is what Mīmāṃsā authors call Continue reading Injunction and denotation in the Veda
“If you can find honey on a tree nearby, why going to the mountains?” arke cen madhu vindeta, kim artham parvataṃ vrajet
In the case of the Śyena and the Agnīṣomīya rituals, violence is once condemned and once allowed, causing long discussions among Mīmāṃsā authors. Similarly, the prohibition to eat kalañja, onion and garlic is interpreted differently than the prohibition to look Continue reading What do I obtain if I refrain from eating onion (and so on)?
The hermeneutic principles are the ones which regard only the Brāhmaṇa texts and whose significance could not be automatically extended outside them, e.g., to a different corpus of texts, or can be extended, but regard characteristics of language. Mīmāṃsā authors Continue reading Hermeneutic principles in Mīmāṃsā
Stephen Nadler has an interesting and provocative address, “History of Modern Philosophy: What is it Good For?” in the recent Proceedings and Addresses of the APA. Among other things, he argues that history of philosophy is just, well, philosophy. All Continue reading Why call it “history of philosophy” anyway?
Mary is a doctor who volunteers often. She works in low income clinics, and travels to foreign nations to treat epidemics. If you ask her why she’s willing to sacrifice her time, she might grip your arm while a look Continue reading Somewhat vague worries about classification and Indian Buddhist ethics
The Mīmāṃsā school of Indian philosophy has at its primary focus the exegesis of Sacred Texts (called Vedas), and more specifically of their prescriptive portions, the Brāhmaṇas. This means that the epistemic content conveyed by the Vedas is, primarily, what Continue reading Conveying prescriptions: The Mīmāṃsā understanding of how prescriptive texts function