Encontros, des-encontros e re-encontros entre o Ocidente e o Oriente: notas sobre o Budismo e o Neo-Budismo Filosófico europeu e português

Abstract

In this paper the author discusses the encounter between Occident and Orient in European philosophy in the second-half of the nineteenth-century and, especially, its philosophical meaning in that context. He takes as case studies Ch. Renouvier and M. Guyau, in France, E. von Hartmann, in Germany, and A. Quental, O. Martins and L. Coimbra in Portugal. He shows that we can find a sort of Buddhism disseminated in several European philosophical circles at that time, mainly in German monism and pantheism, and in French spiritualism and neocriticism. This came about as a result of the interest in using philosophy to explain the relationship between the Individual and the Whole. He suggests that European philosophy didn't actually have a clear view on what Buddhism means and what its implications are. Furthermore, he holds that, long before our contemporary globalization —whose relevance until now can be reduced only to technological aspects— there was a philosophical and religious globalization, at that time, concerning both occidental (Christianity) and oriental religions (Brahmanism and Buddhism), and that Buddhism was at its core.