Buddhist Aretology

To be sure, “aretology” (also called “aretaics”) is said to be “[t]hat part of moral philosophy which treats virtue, its nature, and the means of attaining to it.” It is thus only too natural that one also talks of “Buddhist aretology” inasmuch a greater part of Buddhist doctrine deals precisely with this topic, and in fact with a great degree of sophistication. I am thinking of the Buddhist ideas of śīla (or śīlapāramitā), adhiśīla, saṃvara, samaya, and so on. I intend to return to this page and add points as and when I find time. For now, I wish to merely record and reserve the term “Buddhist aretology” that I need.

Buddhist Hermeneutology

1. RĀ 4.94: Like teaching alphabet and grammar!
2. RĀ 5.87ab: lung rigs ad sensum.
3. RĀ 4.77cd: Rule and exception!
4. RĀ 4.75; 2.42: Bitter pill.
5. RĀ 4.72; 3.64: Ends justify means.

Buddhist Philosophology

I’ve long felt something odd and pretentious about studying past Buddhist philosophers like Nāgārjuna while presenting ourselves as ‘Buddhist philosophers.’ I find myself silently protesting: ‘Nāgārjuna is a Buddhist philosopher; we are students trying to understand his thought through his extant works.’ The fact that we attempt to make sense (or nonsense) of Nāgārjuna’s ideas doesn’t make us Buddhist philosophers. We can certainly study Buddhist philosophy, the history of Buddhist philosophy, or its intellectual development—but calling ourselves ‘Buddhist philosophers’ is another matter entirely.  The other day, however, I stumbled upon a term that crystallizes this distinction: ‘philosophology.’ Robert M. Pirsig uses this term in his philosophical novel Lila: An Inquiry into Morals (New York: Bantam Books, 1991), where he reportedly states, ‘Philosophology is to philosophy as musicology is to music.’ Though I haven’t read the novel myself, this is exactly the distinction I’ve been seeking.  We need to differentiate ‘Buddhist philosophology’ from ‘Buddhist philosophy.’ Academics engaged in studying past Buddhist philosophy are better described as ‘Buddhist philosophologists’ rather than ‘Buddhist philosophers.’ Of course, nothing prevents us from being Buddhist philosophers—just as nothing prevents a musicologist from playing music and being a musician. But the roles and responsibilities of a musicologist and a musician must be clearly distinguished, and the same principle applies here.

A Buddhist Etiology

I am tempted to use the term “Buddhist etiology,” primarily to express the Buddhist theory of the origination of internal world consisting of sentient beings (sattvaloka) or saṃsāric inhabitants and the external world consisting of habitat (bhājanaloka). In certain strands of Buddhism, it may also deal with the origination of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa, and in others with the origination of a human being. The word etiology (or aetiology or ætiology) is said to be the “the study of causation, or origination. The word is derived from the Greek αἰτιολογία, aitiología, ‘giving a reason for’ (αἰτία, aitía, ‘cause,’ and -λογία, -logía).  More completely, etiology is the study of the causes, origins, or reasons behind the way that things are, or the way they function, or it can refer to the causes themselves. The word is commonly used in medicine, (where it is a branch of medicine studying causes of disease) and in philosophy, but also in physics, psychology, government, geography, spatial analysis, theology, and biology, in reference to the causes or origins of various phenomena.” In Buddhist context, too, it can best be employed to express samudayasatya (i.e. causal aspect of saṃsāra) as opposed to duḥkhyasatya (i.e. resultant aspect of saṃsāra). One can also employ this term to express mārgasatya as the cause of nirodhasatya.