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Whereas the discovery by Europeans of the continents of our earth
has been the subject of countless studies and its protagonists
(such as Columbus) are universally known, research on the European
discovery of our globe's "spiritual continents" - its religions and
philosophies - is still in its infancy. The Christian West's
discovery of Asia's largest religion and fount of philosophies,
Buddhism, is a case in point: though it triggered one of the most
significant and influential spiritual and cultural encounters in
world history, even the most basic questions remain unanswered.
What did Europeans first learn about Buddhist thought? When and
where did this discovery take place and who was involved in it?
What kind of Buddhism did they study, how did they understand or
misunderstand it, and what were the repercussions of such
discoveries in Europe? Based on a wide range of sources in European
and Asian languages, Urs App - the author of The Birth of
Orientalism (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010) - identifies
the protagonists of the first Western encounter with Buddhism and
shows how their interpretation of Buddhist doctrines led to the
invention of a single "Oriental philosophy" reigning from Egypt to
Japan: an atheist philosophy anchored in "nothingness" and
"emptiness" that was revealed by the Buddha to his closest
disciples on his deathbed. Leading thinkers of the Enlightenment
came to regard this philosophy as the most ancient form of atheism,
the ancestor of Greek philosophy, the precursor of Spinoza, and the
fount of mysticism as well as countless heresies including monism,
pantheism, quietism, and gnosticism.
Schopenhauer's favorite book was a particular version of the Indian
Upanishads. He encountered it just before he found the centerpiece
of his philosophical system: his concept of will. Though he named
it as the first of three main philosophical influences and kept
calling it the most excellent book in the world, 150 years of
Schopenhauer research have failed to explain the role of these
Latin Upanishads. Based on Schopenhauer's extant copy of the work,
his notebooks and many additional sources, Urs App's study (in
German) offers a completely new picture of the genesis of
Schopenhauer's philosophy. It explains for the first time the role
of Indian, Persian (Sufi), Neoplatonic, and mystical ideas in the
birth of his philosophy and describes the central dynamic that gave
direction to all of his work: Schopenhauer's Compass. Schopenhauer
war der erste gro e Philosoph Europas, der schon in seiner Jugend
tiefes Interesse an asiatischen Philosophien und Religionen zeigte.
Vor der Niederschrift seines Hauptwerkes Die Welt als Wille und
Vorstellung bezeichnete er in seinem Notizbuch die Upanischaden,
Plato und Kant als Haupteinfl sse. Immer wieder betonte der
Philosoph, diese Upanischaden seien das lesenswerteste Werk der
Welt und nannte es den Trost seines Lebens und Sterbens. In seiner
Frankfurter Wohnung lag es immer offen da - zur t glichen
Abendandacht, wie ein Besucher berichtete. Doch die
Schopenhauerforschung hat es hundertf nfzig Jahre lang vers umt,
das Lieblingsbuch des Denkers zu lesen und seine so zahlreichen wie
interessanten handschriftlichen Eintr ge zu studieren. Der
Schopenhauer-Experte und Orientalismus-Spezialist Urs App erkl rt
erstmals, was es mit dieser Hauptquelle Schopenhauers auf sich hat
und zeichnet ein komplett neues Bild der Entstehung von
Schopenhauers Philosophie, in dem auch sein fr hes Interesse an
west- stlicher Mystik und meditativen Zust nden ( besseres
Bewusstsein ) beleuchtet wird. Nicht nur die Urspr nge dieser
Philosophie erscheinen so in neuem Licht: Schopenhauers Kompass
weist auch die Richtung zum Verst ndnis seines gesamten Denkweges.
Modern Orientalism is not a brainchild of nineteenth-century
European imperialists and colonialists, but, as Urs App
demonstrates, was born in the eighteenth century after a very long
gestation period defined less by economic or political motives than
by religious ideology. Based on sources from a dozen languages,
many unavailable in English, The Birth of Orientalism presents a
completely new picture of this protracted genesis, its underlying
dynamics, and the Western discovery of Asian religions from the
sixteenth to the nineteenth century. App documents the immense
influence of Japan and China and describes how the Near Eastern
cradle of civilization moved toward mother India. Moreover, he
shows that some of India's purportedly oldest texts were products
of eighteenth-century European authors. Though Western engagement
with non-Abrahamic Asian religions reaches back to antiquity and
can without exaggeration be called the largest-scale
religiocultural encounter in history, it has so far received
surprisingly little attention-which is why some of its major
features and their role in the birth of modern Orientalism are
described here for the first time. The study of Asian documents had
a profound impact on Europe's intellectual makeup. Suddenly the
Bible had much older competitors from China and India, Sanskrit
threatened to replace Hebrew as the world's oldest language, and
Judeo-Christianity appeared as a local phenomenon on a dramatically
expanded, worldwide canvas of religions and mythologies.
Orientalists were called upon as arbiters in a clash that involved
neither gold and spices nor colonialism and imperialism but,
rather, such fundamental questions as where we come from and who we
are: questions of identity that demanded new answers as biblical
authority dramatically waned.
It is little known that Richard Wagner was among the very first
Westerners to appreciate Buddhism and that he was the first major
European artist to be inspired by this religion. In 1856, in the
prime of his creativity, the 33-year-old artist read his first book
about Buddhism. Madly in love with Mathilde Wesendonck, a beautiful
but happily married woman, he conceived two deeply connected opera
projects: Tristan und Isolde which he went on to compose and stage,
and Die Sieger (The Victors), an opera scenario based on an Indian
Buddha legend translated from Sanskrit. These two projects mirrored
Wagner's burning desire for the consummation of his love and the
necessity of renunciation.This Buddhist opera project occupied
Wagner's mind for decades until his death in 1883. Indeed, the
composer's last words were about the Buddha figure of his scenario
and his relationship with women. Urs App, the author of The Birth
of Orientalism (University of Pennsylvania Press) and the world's
foremost authority on the early Western reception of Buddhism,
tells the story of Richard Wagner's creative encounter with
Buddhism and explains the composer's last words.
Schopenhauer's favorite book was a particular version of the Indian
Upanishads. He encountered it just before he found the centerpiece
of his philosophical system: his concept of will. Though he named
it as the first of three main philosophical influences and kept
calling it the most excellent book in the world, 150 years of
Schopenhauer research have failed to explain the role of these
Latin Upanishads. Based on Schopenhauer's extant copy of the work,
his notebooks and many additional sources, Urs App's study (in
German) offers a completely new picture of the genesis of
Schopenhauer's philosophy. It explains for the first time the role
of Indian, Persian (Sufi), Neoplatonic, and mystical ideas in the
birth of his philosophy and describes the central dynamic that gave
direction to all of his work: Schopenhauer's Compass. Schopenhauer
war der erste gro e Philosoph Europas, der schon in seiner Jugend
tiefes Interesse an asiatischen Philosophien und Religionen zeigte.
Vor der Niederschrift seines Hauptwerkes Die Welt als Wille und
Vorstellung bezeichnete er in seinem Notizbuch die Upanischaden,
Plato und Kant als Haupteinfl sse. Immer wieder betonte der
Philosoph, diese Upanischaden seien das lesenswerteste Werk der
Welt und nannte es den Trost seines Lebens und Sterbens. In seiner
Frankfurter Wohnung lag es immer offen da - zur t glichen
Abendandacht, wie ein Besucher berichtete. Doch die
Schopenhauerforschung hat es hundertf nfzig Jahre lang vers umt,
das Lieblingsbuch des Denkers zu lesen und seine so zahlreichen wie
interessanten handschriftlichen Eintr ge zu studieren. Der
Schopenhauer-Experte und Orientalismus-Spezialist Urs App erkl rt
erstmals, was es mit dieser Hauptquelle Schopenhauers auf sich hat
und zeichnet ein komplett neues Bild der Entstehung von
Schopenhauers Philosophie, in dem auch sein fr hes Interesse an
west- stlicher Mystik und meditativen Zust nden ( besseres
Bewusstsein ) beleuchtet wird. Nicht nur die Urspr nge dieser
Philosophie erscheinen so in neuem Licht: Schopenhauers Kompass
weist auch die Richtung zum Verst ndnis seines gesamten Denkweges.
Richard Wagner war einer der ersten Europ er, der den Buddhismus
sch tzte und darf als der erste gro e K nstler des Westens gelten,
der sich von dieser Religion inspirieren lie .Im Jahre 1856, auf
dem Gipfel seiner k nstlerischen Kreativit t, las der 33-j hrige K
nstler in Z rich sein erstes Buch ber den Buddhismus. Er war damals
v llig verliebt in die gl cklich verheiratete Mathilde Wesendonck
und ersann zwei zutiefst verbundene Opernprojekte, die den
Zwiespalt in seinem Herzen widerspiegelten: Tristan und Isolde, wo
zur Befriedigung des Begehrens alle Konventionen gebrochen werden,
und Die Sieger, ein von einer indischen Buddhalegende inspiriertes
Opernszenario wo Entsagung als h chster Ausdruck der Liebe
dargestellt wird.Dieses buddhistische Opernprojekt besch ftigte
Wagner jahrzehntelang bis zu seinem Tod im Jahre 1883. In der Tat
galten seine letzten Worte der Buddhafigur in seinem Szenario und
deren Bezug zu den Frauen.Urs App, der weltbekannte Historiker der
westlichen Rezeption des Buddhismus, erz hlt die Geschichte von
Richard Wagners kreativer Begegnung mit dieser Religion und erl
utert die letzten Worte des Komponisten.
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