Schopenhauer's Buddhism: A Historical-Philosophical Inquiry

Abstract

My thesis is about Schopenhauer’s conception of Buddhism and the impact of Buddhism on his thought. It closely considers the Buddhist texts Schopenhauer read, with the aim of showing that Schopenhauer adopted a particular reading of Buddhism and that this reading partly influenced his philosophy, in particular his metaphysics. The main contention of the thesis is that from 1844 onwards Schopenhauer incorporated the Buddhist concept of palingenesis into his system, which generated several contradictions in his late works such as the second (1844) and the third edition (1859) of The World as Will and Representation, and Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), including their posthumous versions. I agree with the majority of scholars that Schopenhauer’s system remained a single thought throughout his works. However, I argue that these contradictions indicate the possibility of the emergence of a small system within Schopenhauer’s main system as elaborated in the first edition of The World as Will and Representation, published in 1818. This small system seems to jeopardise the main foundations of Schopenhauer’s prevailing system: its monism, idealism, pessimism, and its ethics of compassion. My dissertation chronologically analyses Schopenhauer’s works as well as his readings on Buddhism. It consists of an introduction, three chapters, and a conclusion. In the introduction, I provide an overview of Schopenhauer’s engagement with Buddhism and of the main arguments of the thesis. In the first chapter, Schopenhauer’s Philosophy and Readings on Buddhism until 1818, I examine the main principles of Schopenhauer’s system in the first edition of The World as Will and Representation and of his readings on Buddhism, offering also a tour d’horizon of the history of Oriental studies from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. In the second chapter, Schopenhauer’s Philosophy and Readings on Buddhism until 1844, addressing both Schopenhauer’s works and his readings on Buddhism from 1825 until 1844, I especially focus on Schopenhauer’s notion of the Buddhist palingenesis as it emerges from the second edition of The World as Will and Representation. In the third and final chapter, Schopenhauer’s Philosophy and Readings on Buddhism from 1850 Onwards, after having examined Schopenhauer’s Buddhist sources of the period, I show the possible implications of Schopenhauer’s incorporation of the Buddhist palingenesis for the understanding of his philosophy. In the conclusion, I summarise my findings and consider their import for nineteenth-century Western philosophy.