Interkulturelles Philosophieren: Theorie und Praxis
Philosophie in der arabisch-islamischen Welt

Unter interkulturellem Philosophieren wird die Bemühung verstanden, in die philosophischen Diskurse Beiträge aller Regionen, Kulturen und Traditionen als gleichberechtigt einzuflechten. Dabei sollen diese nicht nur vergleichend nebeneinander gestellt, sondern so in einen offenen gemeinsamen Raum gebracht werden, dass alle Positionen in diesem polylogischen Gespräch für Veränderungen offen gehalten werden. Interkulturelles Philosophieren ist somit keine bestimmte Theorie, Disziplin oder Schule, sondern steht für eine Neuorientierung in der Praxis des Philosophierens. Der bereits seit 1993/94 bestehende Arbeitskreis am IWK begreift sich dabei als ein Forum für einen solchen philosophischen Polylog, in dem nicht nur das Gespräch zwischen verschiedenen philosophischen Traditionen im Vordergrund steht, sondern auch Anknüpfungspunkte an die lebensweltliche Praxis. Dabei wird besonderes Gewicht auf die emanzipatorischen und rationalen Strömungen in der Philosophie dieser Region gelegt.
Koordination und Organisation

Anke Graneß: Inhaberin einer Elise-Richter-Stelle des FWF und Lehrbeauftragte am Institut für Philosophie der Universität Wien.
Veranstaltungen
Datum/Zeit Veranstaltung
​Do 03/03/2016
19:00–21:00
Jameleddine Ben Abdeljelil: Das Unbehagen an der Tradition im Islam – Bruch und Kontinuität
Institut für Orientalistik, Wien
​Do 17/03/2016
19:00–21:00
Elvira Wakelnig: Philosophie – Falsafa: Von Griechenland in die arabisch-islamische Welt
Institut für Orientalistik, Wien
​Di 12/04/2016
19:00–21:00
Sarhan Dhouib: Intoleranz und Toleranz in der arabischen Moderne
Institut für Orientalistik, Wien
​Mo 23/05/2016
19:00–21:00
Ayman Agbaria: Islamic Jurisprudence of Minorities: Is It Good for All? The Case of the Palestinian Muslim Minority in Israel
Institut für Orientalistik, Wien
​Do 23/06/2016
19:00–21:00
Elizabeth Suzanne Kassab: Enlightenment Debates in Cairo and Damascus on the Eve of the 2011 Uprisings
Institut für Orientalistik, Wien

At first sight, I would have thought that this would have certainly been the case, given that Sacred Texts are, at least in part, prescriptive texts. Further, I have already mentioned the work of Dov Gabbay in formalizing the deontic logic of the Talmud. Nonetheless, I found less than I would have expected (thus, even more than usual, I would be happy to receive further suggestions from readers).

1. Philosophy of Dionysius the Areopagite: Modal Ontology, by Basil Lourié. In: Logic in Orthodox Christian Thinking, ed. by Andrew Schulman, Ontos, Frankfurt a. M. 2012, pp. 230–257.

   The article elaborates on the concept of necessity and possibility in Dyonisius Aeropagita and discusses whether his should be termed an alethic or a deontic logic. The main point is that according to Lourié’s interpretation, Dyonisius’ deontic logic states that only what is necessary is possible, so that necessity and possibility are co-extensive.

2. Simo Knuuttila has analysed in several articles (see the list below) the emergence of deontic logic in Middle Age and Pre-Renaissance thinkers, such Abelard, Thomas the Aquinas, Roger Roseth, Ockham, Duns Scotus and so on. He discussed in particular the definition of categories such as possibility and necessity and the conflict among obligations.

   The Emergence of Deontic Logic in the Fourteenth Century. In: New Studies in Deontic Logic: Norms, Actions and the Foundations of Ethics, edited by Risto Hilpinen, Synthese Library 152, Reidel 1981, pp. 225–250.
   with O. Hallamaa, Roger Roseth and Medieval Deontic Logic. In: Logique et analyse 149, 1995, pp. 75–87.
   with Tania Holopainen, Conditional Will and Conditional Norms in Medieval Thought. In: Synthese 96 (1993), pp. 115–132.

3. James William Forrester has published at least two books (see below) which are much less technical and confront, among other things, the conflicts which occur when Standard Deontic Logic is applied to Christian Theology (for instance, the idea that it is not the case that one ought to do something impossible contrasts, according to Forrester, to Augustine’s and Calvin’s ethics).
   Being Good & Being Logical: Philosophical Groundwork for a New Deontic Logic, Sharpe, Armonk 1996.
   Why You Should: The Pragmatics of Deontic Speech, University Press of New England, Hanover 1989.
4. Whatever Happened to Deontic Logic by Peter Geach. In: Logic and Ethics, edited by Peter Geach and Jacek Holówka, Kluwer, Dordrecht 1991, pp. 33–48

   This article discusses, among other things, paradoxes derived from Anselm of Canterbury and the so-called “Good Samaritan Paradox”. In case you don’t know it, the paradox is solved through the distinction between “Ought to do” and “Ought to be”, since it is certainly the case that one Ought to save someone who has been beaten by thieves, but it is not the case that one Ought to be beaten by thieves.

5. Deontological Square, Hexagon, and Decagon: A Deontic Framework for Supererogation by Jan Joerden. In: Logica Universalis 6.1–2 (2012), pp. 201–216.

   This article (which is too technical for me, thus please take the following with some caution) deals with the application of a deontic theory to Islamic law, with special regard to supererogation and to the ascriptions of praise and blame. The author is conversant with deontic logic, also ante litteram (the Aquinas, Leibniz, Moore, Meinong).

6. Defeasible Logic in Contemporary Bioethics. On the Relevance of Both Casuistry and Islamic Itjihad, by Norman K. Swazo. In: Co-Existing in a Globalised World: Key Themes in Inter-Professional Ethics, edited by Hassan Bashir, Philipp W. Gray and Eyad Masad, Lexington Books, Plymouth 2013, pp. 1–27.

   This article discusses two corpora somehow akin to the Talmud (see my comments below) and their relevance for a case-by-case analysis, which is probably unavoidable in the case of bioethics. It contains also a short depiction of Islamic deontic logic, with its five categories (compulsory, recommended, permissible, unadvised, forbidden).

You might have noticed that seemingly no one but Gabbay and his colleagues tried to apply deontic logic to the concrete analysis of specific statements as found in a given Sacred Text. Why so?

I have no precise answer and it might be only due to the fact that the topic was not deemed to be interesting enough. Should one, however, insist, I could only dare a tentative explanation, namely that deontic logic as we know it originated and developed in a Lutheran environment (namely in Georg von Wright’s Scandinavia). Thus, its main authors were not aware of anything comparable to the Talmud Gabbay could analyse, namely a text in which the prescriptions of a given Sacred Text are carefully analysed, discussed, contrasted and so on. Perhaps the Jesuits’ tradition of Casuistry could have been seen as somehow paralleling the Talmud, but it was only accepted within Catholicism (and violently scolded by Lutheran theologians, if I remember correctly). It is no surprise that Islamic law (and Casuistry, as in the last item cited) build, by contrast, a good example for deontic investigations. The Buddhist Vinaya would have also been an interesting topic of investigation, but to it applies the general lack of team work among Western scholars and experts of Sanskrit, Pāli, Chinese, Tibetan and so on.

What did I miss?

On authors working on Mīmāṃsā deontics, see this post. On our project in general, see this one.
In case you wrote an article on deontic logic as applied to the Quran, or the Pāli Canon, or Matthew’s Gospel and so on, and I did not mention you: I am sorry. Please send me the details and I will be happy to read it and update the post.

Now, I have already commented about it at DailyNous, but the staff of Superscholars has written to me twice to advertise the map, so that I feel compelled to repeat my comment and some further ones here. I would also like to ask readers: Do you think these maps have some use at all? If so, for whom? Beginners or Advanced scholars?

The first problem regards the very scope of the chart, i.e., its being “Eastern”. “Eastern Philosophy” is a geographic abstraction at best unapplicable to philosophy and at worse very misleading —for reasons pointed out by Manyul Im and Malcolm Keating on the DailyNous, i.e., it makes one assume similarities which are not there and overlook similarities between, e.g., the Greek and the Islamic world, which are there.

As for Indian Philosophy, the ancient part is just plainly wrong (see also Malcolm’s comments reproduced here). There is so little to rescue, that it does not make sense even to try. By contrast, the more recent part (on the schools of Vedānta) is still very misleading (what should it mean that in Dvaita “There is a strict distinction between two equally real worlds: one, the Brahman and two individual people”?), but might have some initial value as a draft upon which one should improve.

Since I am not competent enough about Chinese philosophy, let me quote Manyul Im’s aphoristic comment (also from DailyNous):

This may be the worst chart of East Asian philosophy ever. Super Scholar is neither.

On the same website you can find several other comments, ranging from misspelt Chinese characters to misunderstood concepts… Moreover, Tibetan, Japanese and Korean philosophies are altogether absent.

Thus: If you teach an “Eastern Philosophy”, warn your students!

Shail Mayaram, in the introduction of a book dedicated to Daya Krisna and Ramchandra Gandhi, Philosophy as Samvad and Svaraj adds some interesting information about the saṃvādas which have no written record:

A dialogue on bhakti attempted to universalize the phenomenon of devotion and encourage thinking about it philosophically. A dialogue on Śilpaśāstra was held in Amber, Jaipur and brought together traditional sthapatis and architects. I […] was fortunate to be present at the dialogue on Kāshmir [sic!] Śaivism (with a special session in an open ground in Gulmarg). […] Subsequently, two dialogues were held in Lucknow and Hydearabad.

Within the same volume, Mustafa Khawaja reproduces the letter of invitation sent by Daya Krishna to scholars of Islamic philosophy. Daya Krishna predominantely wrote in English, but he was well aware of the risk of neglecting other languages. Thus, the saṃvādas were open to scholars speaking in different languages (as attested also by the proceedings mentioned above) and Daya Krishna was very keen to listen also to marginal philosophical traditions (such as that of the Islamic theologians speaking Urdū). Also the invitation letter is written in two languages and is full of open questions to be debated.
Nonetheless, this openness did not always work. Mayaram writes:

I remember the meeting of the scholars’ group including Daya Krishna, Ram Chandra Dwivedi, Arindam Chakrabarti and Mukund Lath with Laxman Joo, then celebrated as one of the greatest living exponents of the school of philosophy that is popularly known as Kashmir Saivism [I would rather speak of the Pratyabhijñā school, EF]. Laxman Joo responded to their questions with complete silence. […] After their departure, he asked Bettina Bäumer, yeh nāstik kaun the [Who were those non-believers?]

This is an interesting point, because dialogue cannot be imposed on someone, its very “democratic” structure makes this impossible. Thus, what to do with those who do not want to speak? Or is dialogue among people not sharing the same presuppositions (e.g., the same religious praxis) impossible?

On Daya Krishna and his volume on bhakti, see this post and this one respectively. On English as the predominant language, some interesting comments can be read at this post and at the linked ones. I am grateful to Elise Coquereau for sending me a copy of Shail Mayaram’s article.

His (tentative? ironic?) answer was that it was not a coincidence, since for South Asianists interdisciplinarity is not something they need to look for, it is already a given for them —since in the same department live scholars of history, feminist studies, cinema, philology… From the point of view of Islamic studies, Marco Lauri agreed that transdisciplinarity is not bread and butter in Islamic departments. Why so? Perhaps because Islam defined itself since its beginning against the other Abrahamic religions. This led Islamic believers (and consequently also Islamic scholars) to enforce a stricter definition of Islam, one that would not allow for anthropology, religious studies, etc.

Had you asked me, I would have said that most of us work on South Asia just because the Coffee Break Project was born out of the pleasure to work together of a group of friends. Hence the question: Are we here because we work on South Asia? Or is South Asia just the reason why we met? The question is open to readers —even if they work interdisciplinarly outside the Coffee Break Project.

Wooden ceiling of the Mandapa in the Lakshana Devi Temple at Bharmaur, c.700. Photo by Takeo Kamiya

are a way of covering small rooms. In a 2011 article, Gerald Kozicz shows how it has started as a practical solution in areas where wood was scarce, since the Laternendecke made it possible to use also shorter and weaker branches, together with mud. This confirms that its area of origin is Central Asia, from the Aral lake to Punjab. Originally, the Laternendecke had an opening in the middle, which served as a way out for smoke and as a source of light for the room.

In India, this opening has been instead replaced by a circular lotus. This substitution already hints at what happened to the Laternendecke: as can be observed in this wonderful image, this originally practical solution led to wonderful architectonical executions, of great esthetic and symbolic value.

That the Laternendecke has been reused although there was no practical need of it, is due, Kozicz explains, to its symbolic resemantization. The central lotus hints at an axis mundi, around which the cosmos, in the form of concentric squares, rotates. The similarity with other concentric structures, from the Buddha’s nimbus to the maṇḍalas, will not go unnoticed.

Back to Central Asia, the Laternendecke has been reused also where it made no structural sense, e.g., in the caves of Bamiyan, and in other rock- and cave-structures. Since Bamiyan was a central focus in the commercial routes, since the time of the Kuśānas, the Buddhist symbolic language, together with the Laternendecke, could reach the Taklamakan area and last also China.

Interestingly enough, in China the motif has been reused in still a different way, i.e., as simply a flat decorative element.

The flat Laternendecke in a Chinese cave. Photo from www.cavetemples.com

The Islamic conquerors in South Asia often destroyed, out of their iconoclastic tendencies, many Buddhist and Hindu sites, but the floral motif of the lotus could be easily incorporated in their decorative patterns, as Kozicz shows in the case of a Laternendecke originally “Hindu” and integrated in the Adina Mosque in West Bengal.

Finally, the Laternendecke reaches its greatest potential in Ladakh (Kozicz, p. 53), which had witnessed around 1000 a new golden age due to the collapse of other easier routes, which had been occupied by the Islamic invaders. Here the Laternendecke has some variations (e.g., with trapeziums instead of triangles on the periphery of the bigger square) and more importantly it becomes a way to depict whole maṇḍalas in a three-dimensional way. Buddhas are depicted in the vertical spaces, so that they can actually look at the centre of the maṇḍala (the lotus, here used as a Mahāyāna-Vajrāyāna symbol).

Thus, the Laternendecke has a long history of reuse and risemantizations, interestingly enough some of them have occurred through the same elements (such as the lotus at the centre), which have acquired a different value in Hindū, Buddhist or Islamic context.

Kozicz’ article (as usual in his works) includes beautiful images and architectonic schemes.

Gerald Kozicz, “Die Laternendecke: Von den Höhentempeln Bamiyans zu den Stupas von Alchi”. In: Robert Kostka (ed.) Wakhan. Talschaft zwischen Pamir und Hindukusch. Graz 2011 (you can download it freely from this link).

Friday is reading day on this blog. For my monthly planning, see here.