/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.17571453]

Can someone explain to me why reading Plato's Phaedo and the Upanishads feels like I'm reading the same thing?
Did Plato have knowledge of the Vedas?

[Philolochad: Master of this Th(...) No.17572185]

>>17571453
This is certainly a hot topic, as the similarities are undeniably both in terms of epistemology and ethics (s. THE SELF-CHARIOTS OF LIBERATION: PLATO'S "PHAEDRUS", THE "UPANIṢADS", AND THE "MAHĀBHĀRATA" IN SEARCH OF ETERNAL BEING by Nina Budziszewska). Whether or not anyone from the school of Athens was able to reach India or if Hindoo scholars visited Hellas is impossible to know. Striking linguistic similarities between, for example, Homer/Pindar and the Vedas (Homeric "Ήπιος "Friendly" and Vedic Āpí- "Friend" by Edwin D. Floyd; Pindar's Rigveda by Calvert Watkins) seem to show that a connection, not to speak of influence per se, is at least plausible. Also bump.

[Anonymous No.17572463]

>>17571453

[Anonymous No.17573501]

bump

[Anonymous No.17573511]

>>17571453
Same Indo-European spirituality lies behind both systems. It's that simple OP.

[Anonymous No.17574245]

>>17571453

>"It is impossible to read the Vedānta or the many fine compositions in illustration of it, without believing that Pythagoras and Plato derived their sublime theories from the same fountain with the sages of India."
- Sir William Jones (1746 – 1794)

[Anonymous No.17574259]

>>17574245
I would be careful about reading Advaita Vedanta interpretations such as Shankara's as a commentary to the Upanishads, they are extremely reliant on Buddhist philosophy (Shankara is called a "cryptobuddhist" by most Hindus, and most scholars agree). If you want to read the Upanishads, work through them with editions and commentaries that aren't sectarian, or at least read an interpretation that is closer to the original meaning of the Upanishads, rather than Shankara's 9th century AD quasi-buddhism.

[Anonymous No.17574279]

>>17574259

Buddhism was a reaction to Hinduism. Buddhists were ancient antifa members—i.e., last men—that resented the caste system, so they took Hinduism and tried to negate one of its essential tenets, the Self. This failed, obviously, but the arguments between Hindus and Buddhists helped grow India’s philosophical tradition, culminating in Shankara (pbuh) and leading to the irrevocable refutation of the school of sophistry known as (((Buddhism))).

[Anonymous No.17574281]

>>17574259
Here we go

[Anonymous No.17574301]

>>17574279
Please be aware that guenonfag, the advaita expert on /lit/ and number one Adi Shankara superfan, has finally accepted the consensus of scholarship and Hindus that Shankara was ripping off mahayana buddhism.