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Moral Moments

The History of the World, Part 2

by Joel Marks

An Asian philosopher once explained the layout of Oriental philosophy to me quite succinctly: Chinese philosophy is Far Eastern, Indian is South Asian, and Islamic is Near Eastern. I shall try to expand on that at slightly greater length in the present column, which carries on the project I discussed previously (in Issue 47) of introducing or, you might say, orienting Occidentals to Asian traditions of thought that rival our own in pedigree and scope. (I have, however, relegated Islam to the ‘Western’ tradition due to its Abrahamic lineage.) Although not all Westerners are as geographically challenged as one of my college students who asked, “Where’s Asia?” many Americans, at least, do show amazingly little recognition of the great philosophical traditions of the rest of the world. (Now that I think about it, they show amazingly little recognition of the Western tradition as well! But you, Dear Reader, have demonstrated your intellectual spunk by reading this magazine.

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