Wittgenstein and Buddhism

Abstract

In view of the prevailing East-West philosophical apartheid there will, presumably, be two fairly distinct groups of readers of this book. To those interested more in Wittgenstein than in Buddhism I have nothing philosophically startling to say (although perhaps some of Wittgenstein's ideas may have a slightly different flavour after being set alongside similar ideas differently expressed). Any interest for them will be aroused largely by the novelty of the historical coincidences. Readers of Wittgenstein do not normally suffer from deja vu because they have never seen any reason to regard Buddhist philosophy as relevant to their concerns, perhaps regarding it as too tainted by mysticism or devotionalism to be hard-headed and painstaking. I hope that this will be seen to be a false dichotomy in this case. Those whose interest lies in Buddhism rather than in Wittgenstein will be familiar with parallels, spurious and otherwise, which have been held to obtain between Buddhism and Western philosophy. But apart from offering yet more of these, I have tried to show that academic philosophy can help to clarify religious statements. The approach of a modern Western philosopher often means trouble for the Christian theologian, who is not infrequently left with the feeling that his beliefs have been so~ehow demeaned. Buddhists have, I think, less to fear. If this is so, it has probably something to do with the fact that Buddhism has, for mo~t of its life, been much more overtly philosophical than has Christianity. At all events, the school of Mahayana Buddhism with which I shall be chiefly concerned - the Madhyamika - has least of all to fear, since it represents philosophical Buddhism par excellence.