An Introduction to Chinese Philosophy: From Ancient Philosophy to Chinese Buddhism

by JeeLoo Liu

An Introduction to Chinese Philosophy unlocks the mystery of ancient Chinese philosophy and unravels the complexity of Chinese Buddhism by placing them in the contemporary context of discourse.

Genres: Philosophy, China, History, Nonfiction

456 pages, Hardcover

First published April 28, 2006

Reviews

[Yun Rou · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are few more difficult subjects to tackle, especially in encyclopedic fashion as the current volume does, than Chinese philosophy. This is a credible piece of coverage, a good start for those interested, and fairly readable, particularly compared to others. The text advances the general tenet of each school or lineage and then gets grittier in its treatment. IMHO, it's best to use a few different books as one works one's way through the material, comparing and contrasting viewpoints and presentations. It's a scholarly pursuit and deserves a scholarly strategy. That having been said, I'd include this book in that endeavor.

[Emiliano Castillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great overview of Chinese Philosophy.
It suffers from the same mistakes academics usually make when discussing Chan (which it goes into in its final chapter), which I can't really blame on the author, since that's the current state of academia. However, I find it unacceptable for this book to use sources like Alan Watts instead of including the Book of Serenity or the Blue Cliff Record (which are books written by actual Chan Masters about their own tradition) in its bibliography.

[Madeline]

I've been using this as a kind of supplement while teaching the Chinese texts this semester. I think there are a lot of good things about it - it's meticulous, and Liu will often schematize arguments in a way that's probably useful for a lot of readers. (And would make it a good teaching resource.) It also gives good discussion of the secondary literature, the contemporary interpretations of the texts.

But there's something sort of anachronistic and vaguely uncharitable about a lot of Liu's analysis. There's a lot of laying out of, for example, Mengzi's argument for human nature being good and then saying, "this argument fails." But I suspect that is not a terribly fruitful way to approach these texts - I prefer Joel Kupperman's approach, on the whole. Liu seems to be trying to break them down, rather than find out what makes them appealing.

Though of course I haven't read as closely as it deserves; and I am genuinely looking forward to the chapters on Chinese Buddhism.