ভূমিকা
Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books A History of Muslim Philosophy Volume 1, Book 1 Chapter 2: Pre-Islamic Chinese Thought Pre-Islamic Chinese Thought by Howard F.
Didsbury, Jr., M.A., Ph.D., Associate Professor of History, Newark State College, Union, New Jersey and Adjunct Professor at the American University, Washington D.C (U.S.A) In the present chapter we shall attempt to survey some of the salient features of Chinese philosophy avoiding any specialized or detailed discussion of the individual schools or of the philosophical technicalities involved.
Our purpose is to present, in brief compass, an account of Chinese philosophical thought indicating a number of its peculiar characteristics and its apparent major limitations. This, then, will be a summary of the outstanding peculiarities of Chinese philosophy prior to the arrival of any significant foreign influence. First, a few words with respect to the period of Chinese philosophy we are covering, that of the Chou Dynasty (1122 ‑256 B.C.).
The last centuries of the Chou were marked by political and social turmoil associated with the disintegration of feudalism. The Chinese world was torn by internecine warfare, old political powers were overturned and old values challenged or discarded.
During this “time of troubles,” to use Toynbee's term China produced a great variety of original schools of philosophical thought, such as Confucianism, Taoism, Mohism, and Legalism as well as a Chinese version of Epicureanism, the so‑called Logicians, and the Yin Yang school. Because of the creative freshness and richness of the later Chou, it may be regarded as the classical period of Chinese philosophy.
Our discussion is, perforce limited to these classical philosophies and their spirit; Chinese medieval and modern philosophies are not delineated, nor are Buddhism in China, nor Chinese Buddhism. The primary reason for this concentration on the Chou philosophies is that they represent the indigenous Chinese schools of philosophy before they were affected by the advent of other philosophical or religious idea, for example, Buddhism and its attendant Indian metaphysics.