Halbfass' account is only a "caricature"

neo Joined: 08 25 04 Posts: 2474 Posted: 01/05/07, 9:44 am Post subject: Culture and integral Yoga for kela. Happy new year de kela Here is a link to a review of Wilhem Halbfass´s book "India and Europe" . I presume you have read it, and I want your opinion about that essay written by a hindu college of yours. .sciy.org/blog/_archives/2006/9/27/2367727

kela Joined: 08 27 04 Posts: 1807 Posted: 01/14/07, 10:04 pm Post subject: a good review...written by someone who appears to know their stuff. but clearly written from the point of view of one of the "true believers" (as the second half of the review reveals). this observation: Quote:

But Halbfass' exclusive selection of Shankara and a few Buddhist thinkers (all examples of an excessive dependence on logic) to make his point of the absence of "experience" as a basis of thinking in Indian philosophy is a gross over-simplification that caricatures the rich and complex field of traditional Indian thought. Though Halbfass draws attention to Bengal Vaishnavism in a footnote when dealing with Debendranath Tagore's deviation from Rammohun Roy in trusting to the primacy of his experience, we find no mention of either Vaishnava, Tantric or Shaivite sources in his discussion of "experience" in Indian tradition. Why this prioritization of Advaita Vedanta and Buddhism?

is excellent, except the bit about "logic." it has f-all to do with "logic" (a charge that reveals the author's new-age slant) and has everything to do with attempting to justify scriptural authority. i thought much the same as the above when i read halbfass and this is precisely what i would like to address at my site someday. i think that much the same can be said for the idea of "inclusivism"; there too, a kind of continuum can be drawn up. personally, as i have noted here before, i think that various modernist movements draw upon and transmute, in various ways, certain tantric notions. various dichotomies, practising/talking; pundit/sage; and experience and its various contrasts, represent adaptations of tantric ideas and ideas from other pre-modern movements that opposed the mainstream brahmanic culture.

it is indeed not as black and white as halbfass seems to suggests in his short articles. of course, he knew this; he was going for a particular effect. to be fair to these topics, each would require separate monographs. halbfass is, perhaps, justified with the experience contrast insofar as people like vivekananda claim to be giving an accurate account of advaita vedanta. but i think halbfass' account it is only a "caricature" if one actually believes that that is the whole picture. i doubt that halbfass actually thought that he was presenting the whole picture. so, "potentially misleading" might be a better description.

the second half of the review, where aurobindo is dealt with, is less interesting and sounds defensive. kela Lightmind Forums Forum Index -> World of Ken Wilber