Customer Reviews

Philosophic Classics: Asian Philosophy, Volume VI

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This work is excellent in its coverage and has a good set of translations.
It covers both Indian and Chinese philosophy. The anthology is very comprehensive in its temporal range. It has the ancient classics, medieval classics and a few, mostly popular and readable twentieth century collections. The Chinese philosophy section is valuable in that it is very comprehensive. Only Wing Tsit Chan'sA Source Book in Chinese Philosophy older anthology is more comprehensive. A cutting edge scholarship recent anthology of Chinese thought, Ivanhoe and Van Norden'sReadings in Classical Chinese Philosophy, covers only the ancient, Warring States period. If one wishes to cover Buddhism and neo-Confucianism as well, one must use either Chan or the present anthology. One feature of the present anthology that makes it superior to Chan, is that a number of the translations are of complete, self-contained works, such as Confucius and Lao Tzu. It has fewer works than Chan but major ones. Also, it concludes with some twentieth century selections, most notably Mao Tse Tung. It also includes Lin Yutang, but I wish the latter were replaced with a more intellectual and scholarly 20thC Chinese work. Overall it is an ideal anthology. I only wish it were split into an Indian and a Chinese half-volume, for those like me who teach only Chinese philosophy. The only other disadvantage of the anthology is its exorbitant price, though that is par for the course with most textbooks today.

I used this book for a class in Asian Religions. The book in my opinion gave a good understanding of Asian religions based on a Western Society view. In no way is this book meaning to say that the views of the religions are completely accurate, but it attempts to give an understanding of the religions based on introductions written by the editor and readings that are suppose to be accurately translated. The readings are meant to inspire discussion and not convert the person to the religion.