Tubaly, S orcid.org/0000-0003-4648-9342 (2022) A Dialogue of Life and Death: Transformative Dialogue in the Katha Upanishad and Plato’s Phaedo. Journal of Indian Philosophy and Religion, 27. pp. 54-87. ISSN 0971-944X
Abstract
The Phaedo’s intense preoccupation with the notions of self-liberation and self-transcendence in the face of death is strikingly reminiscent of Hindu and Buddhist philosophies. It is therefore not surprising that comparative philosophers have shown great interest in comparing this particular Platonic work to various South Asian texts: The Phaedo has been compared to the philosophy underlying yoga and Patanjali, The Tibetan Book of the Dead, and Mahāparinibbāṇa Sutta, the canonical account of the Buddha’s final days. Of particular relevance is the Katha Upanishad, which shares with the Phaedo enough common features, both textual and structural and thematic, for a comparative analysis to be fruitful. These striking resemblances enable me to bring important dissimilarities in the dialogical processes into focus— dissimilarities which have much to convey to us philosophically. These dissimilarities demonstrate that although the two traditions engaged in transformative ideas and practices that centered on the liberation of the soul, there is still a substantial difference between the nature of the philosophy celebrated by the Greeks and the mystical thought developed by the Upanishadic sages.
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Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | This item is protected by copyright, all rights reserved. This is an author produced version of an article published in Journal of Indian Philosophy and Religion. Uploaded with permission from the publisher. |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science (Leeds) > School of Philosophy (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 18 Oct 2021 12:27 |
Last Modified: | 23 Jan 2023 12:33 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Society for Indian Philosophy and Religion |
Identification Number: | 10.5840/jipr2022272 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:179292 |