Caste and Buddhist Philosophy

Vincent Eltschinger, Caste and Buddhist Philosophy

From: Alexander von Rospatt   I am glad to announce the recent publication of

Vincent Eltschinger, Caste and Buddhist Philosophy: Continuity of Some

Buddhist Arguments against the Realist Interpretation of Social

Denominations. (Motilal Banarsidass, 2012, xxi, 235 p, ISBN:

9788120835597)

In the Buddhist Tradition Series published by Motilal

Banarsidass. This important book has previously only been published in

French (Vienna: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien,

Universität Wien, 2000) and is now for the first time made available

in English.

Here is a brief description:

From the sixth to the eighth century CE, the Buddhist philosophers

paid considerable attention to the issue of the caste-classes. Far

from seeking to reform the non-Buddhist social environment, they

endeavoured to undermine theoretical attempts at “naturalizing” the

social statuses, especially Kumarila’s doctrine of the perceptibility

of jati. Significant parts of their critique is strongly indebted to

earlier, mainly canonical arguments shaped in order to neutralize the

Brahmins’ pride in caste. But closer scrutiny also reveals the

innovations that were made possible by the renewal of Buddhist

semantics around the so-called apoha (“exclusion”)

theory. Eltschinger’s study presents the gist of the early Buddhist

arguments, the modalities of their appropriation by later philosophers

as well as the new developments induced by the epistemologists.

The author offers a detailed analysis of the arguments against the

Brahmanic ìnaturalization of caste, ”as propounded by Dharmakirti

(ca. 600 CE) and his successors up to Prajnakaragupta (ca. 800 CE),

and in the process pays close attention to their historical context as

exemplified by the writings of Aryadeva, Vasubandhu, Dharmapala, and

Candrakirti. The first section provides a survey of the canonical

material in relevant Pali Suttas and subsequent Avadana and Jataka

literature. The main part of the book presents the final stage in the

evolution of polemics against the “naturalization” of caste in the

sense of “any attempt to include caste among the things that do not

depend or proceed exclusively from human thought and arbitrary

conventions, i.e., to consider caste as agreeing with nature and not

merely with people’s social and linguistic habits.
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Alexander von Rospatt, Professor
Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies
Group in Buddhist Studies, Director
University of California
7233 Dwinelle Hall # 2540
Berkeley, CA 94720-2540
USA
Phone: +1-510-6421610
Fax: +1-510-6432959
Email: rospatt@berkeley.edu
http://sseas.berkeley.edu/people/faculty/alexander-von-rospatt