Recap and Requests

Oct 3, 2022

Hello! I want to warmly welcome all the new subscribers while being thankful to the existing ones for supporting this newsletter. Your presence gives me the motivation to continue on this path. Before heading into our next issue, I would like to provide a quick recap for our new subscribers and know about any topic requests from our active readers.

Recap

I’ve published twenty issues on Indian Philosophy so far, covering different topics across Nyāya, Vedānta, Buddhism, Jainism, Cārvaka, Yoga, and Sāṃkhya. If these names sound unfamiliar, you can go through an overview of different schools of Indian Philosophy.

Indian Philosophy

The Indian schools of philosophy

The Indian subcontinent has a rich philosophical tradition that originated in the Vedas around two thousand years before Common Era (B.C.E). Multiple schools of thought emerged over time that either believed in the Vedas' authority or refuted it for naturalistic and skeptical thinking. Traditionally, the schools have been classified on their belief in V…

2 years ago · 4 likes · 4 comments · Adit Gupta

After getting an overview, it’s worth familiarising yourself with the philosophical system of Sūtra and Bhāshya in India while also going through a visualisation of the most prominent philosophers from the Indian subcontinent.

Indian Philosophy

A wise line of philosophy

We cannot isolate philosophy from the history of the land. Society and culture form the soil from which thoughts germinate to become trees of wisdom over time. And when the soil remains fertile over centuries, the trees give rise to forests, and the forests give back to the land and its people. Such is the life of philosophy; such is the philosophy of l…

2 years ago · 5 likes · Adit Gupta

Post the introductory articles, deep-dive into the philosophies of different schools that cover multiple aspects of metaphysics, epistemology, and logic:

Logic and epistemology in Nyāya philosophy with a focus on ordinary and extraordinary perception.
Learn how Buddha used similes to explain moral and ethical ideas to the common public and how later Buddhist philosophers proposed astounding philosophies of causality and language with their intellectual prowess.
Sāṃkhya will mesmerise and perhaps surprise you with its metaphysical theory of evolution and causation, while Yoga teaches you to stay positive in life.
Jain philosophy gives an important lesson about understanding things from multiple perspectives.
The Cārvakas tell you to be pragmatic and focus on the present rather than worrying about the afterlife or anything beyond the senses.
The beautiful philosophy of Advaita Vedānta breaks down the dualism of the Absolute (Brahman) and the Self (Ātman) while helping you find the way from illusion to illumination.

Indian Philosophy is vast. While I’ve briefly covered the core ideas from different schools, a lot remains for a philosophical tradition with a rich history of more than 2500 years.

Requests

I would like to know your requests in the comments for any topic that you want me to cover in this newsletter. It can be a deep dive into an existing article or something that has not been covered yet. If you want to drop a detailed note, feel free to reach out at aditgupta (@) gmail.

Looking forward to hearing from you! 🙂

2 Comments

The face in the mirror

Writes The face in the mirror

Oct 3, 2022Liked by Adit Gupta

Thanks for the great overview of ‘Indian Philosophy’. Would you be able to point out similar concepts in Western philosophy as and when they occur? Perhaps its too much of an ask!

Enjoy your visualizations, clearly you put a lot of thought into your articles.

Expand full comment

1 reply by Adit Gupta

1 more comment…