Systems of Indian Philosophy

Author(s): Virchand R Gandhi
Publisher: Mahavir Jain Vidyalay

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INTRODUCTION
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is only after fulfilling these two rather irksome requirements that one would find it possible to rightly understand what a particular system of Indian philosophy says on this or that problem it has cared to investigate. And then comes the question of offering interpretations to what has been taught by a system of Indian Philosophy, interpretations that are bound to differ in case they happen to be offered by students whose own ideological affiliations are mutually different. Of course, the ideological affiliation of an interpreter of Indian Philosophy (for that matter, of any philosophy whatsoever) need not bear a recognized 'label' but it should be something precisely definable nevertheless. For example, the general standpoint of Radhakrishnan (and of those numerous prominent Indian authors who have followed his lead) can rightly be called Advaita Vedantic, but it will be somewhat difficult to give a name to the general standpoint of a Max Müller or a Deussen. But both Max Müller and Deussen were good Christians deeply in sympathy with Kant, and the fact is largely responsible for the way they have handled the problems of Indian Philosophy. Certainly, a Western movement for the study of Indian Philosophy headed by persons like Max Müller and Deussen could not but present the Advaita Vedānta of Sankara in the most favourable light and judge each and every other system of Indian Philosophy on the basis of the distance that separates it from this Advaita Vedanta, a procedure essentially the same as was subsequently followed by Radhakrishnan and others in India. This circumstance is a good deal responsible for the somewhat lop-sided development of the studies related to Indian Philosophy that have been conducted in the West and in India in the course of past hundred years or so. Gandhi's keen eyes could see the danger inherent in the situation, as should be evident from the following comment he made (in his article published in Mind) by way of taking mild exception to a statement occurring in the Prospectus of the newly founded