Part I
Character and Methodology of Comparative Philosophy - with Special Reference to Advaita and Neoplatonism
1. Introduction
A Western student of Advaita cannot approach his subject in the same way as a philosophy which belongs to his own tradition. Nobody is entirely free to think as he wishes, for first reactions are partly determined by a philosophical background. The relation to one's own background determines the direction one should take in order to reach a system of thought like Advaita. So the simplest kind of comparative philosophy comes into being: that between one's own view of one's own philosophic background and the philosophy which is the object of study. Comparative philosophy therefore cannot be avoided when a system like Advaita is studied outside its own tradition.
Comparative philosophy however is not a technique, a tool, of which the origin is irrelevant and which has no history like a machine: it is a phenomenon which originated in Western civilization and it has to be understood as such. Though it came into being with the book of Paul Masson-Oursel, La philosophie comparée, in 1923, its manifestation was foreshadowed in various ways and is characteristic of European culture. In order to see what comparative philosophy means and can mean, it becomes desirable to consider its background.
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