Introduction to the Study of the Hindu Doctrines

Greek civilization itself is far from having had that originality that those who are incapable of seeing anything beyond it delight in proclaiming; these individuals would even go so far as to claim that the Greeks slandered themselves whenever they happened to acknowledge what they owed to Egypt, Phoenicia, Chaldea An ancient region in southern Mesopotamia, often used here to refer to the broader Sumero-Babylonian culture., Persia, and even India. Despite all these civilizations being incomparably older than that of the Greeks, certain people, blinded by what we might call "classical prejudice" classical prejudice The intellectual bias that views ancient Greece as the sole starting point of "true" civilization and rational thought, often dismissing earlier contributions from the East., are quite ready to maintain, against all evidence, that it was the older civilizations that borrowed from the latter and underwent its influence. It is very difficult to argue with such people, precisely because their opinion rests only on prejudice; however, we shall return more fully to this question. It is true that the Greeks did possess a certain originality, but it is not at all what is commonly believed; it consists of little more than the form in which they presented and explained what they borrowed, modifying it more or less successfully to adapt it to their own mentality—a mentality quite different from that of the Orientals original: "Orientaux." In this context, the peoples of the East., and even already opposed to it in more than one way.

Before going further, we should clarify that we do not intend to contest the originality of Hellenic civilization The culture of ancient Greece. from certain points of view that are, in our opinion, more or less secondary—from the point of view of art, for example—but only from the strictly intellectual point of view, which is, moreover, much more reduced there than among the Easterners. This diminution of intellectuality—this "shrinking," so to speak—can be clearly stated in relation to the Eastern civilizations that still survive and which we know directly. It is likely the same in relation to those that have disappeared, based on everything we can know of them, and especially based on the analogies that clearly existed between the former and the latter. Indeed, the study of the East as it still is today—if one were willing to undertake it in a truly direct manner—would be capable of helping to a large extent in understanding antiquity, because of that character of fixity and stability we have indicated; it would even help in understanding Greek antiquity, for which we do not have the resource of direct testimony. This is because we are dealing there with a civilization that is quite truly extinct, and the modern Greeks could in no way be regarded as the legitimate continuators of the ancients, of whom they are likely not even the authentic descendants A controversial historical view held by the author, suggesting a rupture in both bloodline and tradition between ancient and modern Greece..

One must take great care, however, that Greek thought is, despite everything,

Greek civilization, East, classical prejudice, intellectuality, antiquity, Egypt, Phoenicia, Chaldea, Persia, India